EXPERTISE

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY Our services include: Copyright, Industrial Designs, Intellectual Property Management, Patents, Trademarks, Trade Secrets, Licensing, Merchandising and Branding

Ownership conferring rights to possess, use or dispose of products created by human ingenuity, including patents, trademarks and copy rights.

Patent

A patent is a grant of some privilege, property or authority made by the government or sovereign of a country to one or more individuals. A patent secures a jurisdictional right to exclusive manufacturing and sales of the patented article; exclusive only in the jurisdiction in which the patent is issued.

Each country has its own patent laws therefore an individual or individuals must obtain an patent in each country in order to achieve protection. In order to help cut cost there is however an international treaty - the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT). This treaty has over 120 member countries and allows for the filing of one patent application with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).

In the application you must specify the member countries you wish to receive patent protection. This method allows a patent to be protected in most jurisdictions.

If a jurisdiction is not a member of the PCT a patent may still be able to be registered by using the provisions of the Paris Convention.

Advantages of a Patent

A Patent can promote economic development:

• Patent information facilitates technology transfer and investment
• Patent encourages Research and Development (R&D) at universities and research centers
• Patent are catalysts of new technologies and businesses
• Businesses accumulates and use patents in licensing, joint ventures and other revenues-generating transactions

TradeMark

A trademark functions on three different levels: as indications of origin of ownership, as a guarantee of constancy of quality or other characteristics of a product or service, and as medium of advertisement.

A trademark guarantees, identifies and sells the product or service to which it refers. Trademarks constitute a company's most valuable asset in a world now dominated by communication and massive globalized markets.

Trademarks perform valuable macro-economic functions in terms of identifying the origin of products and technologies and thereby fostering accountability to the consumer. They play a strategic marketing role in individual enterprises. The most common use of trademarks is in consumer advertising to promote product sales, but trademark use has become increasingly sophisticated and varied.

An example of the growing complexity of trademarks use in marketing is illustrated in the licensing of the Harry Potter character from the popular children's book services by J. K. Rowling. Warner Brothers which acquired worldwide merchandising rights to the work, was amazed to see one of the biggest movie opening of all times as "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" earned an estimated US 93.5 million in its first three days. Warner Brothers had divided up the license rights among its various business partners/licensees. In a complex network of agreements, the trademark license became a way of "extending the brand" and co-marketing, so that each product created helped to sell the other products by reinforcing the popularity of the character.

As technology has become an increasingly important component of business, uses of trademarks have changed and become more complex, such as signaling compliance with safety requirements, the fulfillment of technical specifications, or the interoperability of complex technical systems. In another technology-driven trend, the rise of the Internet has raised a number of difficult issues relating to the interplay between domains and trademarks.

Trademarks are effective business tools that can communicate a strong, focused message about products, technologies, cultures and individuals. Unlike patents and copyrights, trademarks can be renewed indefinitely which makes them a very powerful IP asset.

Copyright

The term copyright means what it says; the right to make copies of a given work and to prevent others from making copies without formal authorization.

Copyright is the area of law that provides protection to original works of authorship such as books, painting, architecture, musical compositions and computer software. The legal protection afforded such works permits the development and flourishing of cultural industries, as well as technology-oriented businesses based on computer software and other technologies. Looking at the United States of America for 2001, the total copyright based industries contributed an estimated US $791.2 billion to the economy, representing approximately 7.75 percent of GDP.

The entire process underlying the business model of the music industry starts with a song or more accurately a musical composition. The songwriter or the composer are the owner(s) of all copyright in the musical composition at the point of fixation, that is, when it is physically "fixed" either in musical notes or by using analog or digital recording capacities. Upon creation of fixation, depending on the national legislation, copyright protection automatically comes into force without further formality.

The introduction and enhancement of new media, information and telecommunications technology such as the videocassette recorder (VCR) in the late 1970s, the digital revolution in the 1980s and the Internet in the 1990s has consistently challenged both copyright laws and the cultural industries and communities that live and prosper under them.

The content of DVDs is easy to copy and to post on the Internet and millions of unauthorized copies could potentially, be pirated in this way. Strong efforts are underway by the audiovisual industry to prevent such activity and where it does occur, to prohibit such actions and seek civil or criminal penalties against those responsible. Technological measures such as encryption are essential tools to stop digital piracy. The WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT) and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty (WPPT), the most recent international treaties in the copyright and related rights arena contain special provisions which prohibit circumvention of such measures of technological protection for copyright works.

INTERNATIONAL COMPANIES

We serve our clients through the use of interdisciplinary partners and associates located around the world.

An international company is essentially no different from one incorporated in an individual's own country of residence and can therefore trade, hold assets or investments, have a corporate persona and enjoy limited liability.

The purpose of the structure is to separate the assets in each cell from those in other cells. The PCC has its roots in the insurance industry, other users however are attracted to the concept

INTERNATIONAL TRUST

The Trust

We collaborate with STEP professionals for the drafting of trusts and for the provision of accounting services associated with the operation of those trusts.

A trust is a legal document under which one person gives (the Settlor) away the enjoyment of assets to an individual or group of individuals (the Beneficiaries) while control and decisions on investment of those assets lies with another person (the Trustee). The trust is an important tax planning tool because it allows beneficial enjoyment of an asset to be separated from the legal ownership of that asset.The Settlor who established the trust no longer owns the assets he has put in trust, though he retains 'control' over them.

The Settlor retains 'control' of the asset by establishing a series of rules and regulations which govern how the assets are to be dealt with. The trust once established provides an efficient and flexible structure to mitigate taxation and to enable efficient management and investment of the trust assets. The trust has considerable benefits in assets protection and inheritance planning.

The Settlor

The Settlor is the person who settles the property or tangibles into the custody of the trustee. Unless there are specific provisions in the trust deed, his legal role both starts and ends when he has established the trust. A settlor however can also become a beneficiary.

The Trustee

The trustee hold the legal title to the assets on trust for the beneficiaries. The Trustee is guided and regulated by the trust deed. The trustee duty is to administer the assets in the trust and eventually to distribute them in accordance with the terms of the trust deed. The trustee is the legal owner of the trust assets, but he has not right to consummate or enjoy it.

The trustee is usually based abroad in a low tax jurisdiction. The trust law of many common law jurisdictions is based on English trust law but there are subtle and in some cases major differences between the jurisdiction.

The Beneficiaries

The beneficiaries of a trust have the beneficial enjoyment of the trust assets i.e. financial distributions to beneficiaries or the use of trust property, i.e. using a house which forms part of the trust assets.

PROJECT FINANCE

Project finance is used to build projects such as hotels, resorts, large-scale energy, infrastructure, toll roads, ethanol, and recycling projects, as well as many others. Project finance involves careful analysis and structuring of a wide variety of risks.