INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
• Does the design contract protect the designer’s intellectual property? Does the contract provide that any licence of the intellectual property rights granted by the designer are subject to payment of the design fees, and that if the designer is not paid the licence will be immediately withdrawn?
Design rights protect the outward appearance of an article resulting from its features, in particular, the shape, lines, contours, texture, colour, materials used and its ornamentation — for example, the shape of a superyacht hull or deck design may qualify for protection.
Intellectual property (IP) is concerned with creations, such as inventions, literary and artistic works, designs, and names and symbols used in a commercial context. IP can be legally protected, for example by way of copyright, designs, patents and trade marks. These rights can help to ensure that inventors and designers are recognised for and profit from their work, and are protected against the misuse and/or misappropriation of their works by others.
IP includes such rights as: confidential information and trade secrets, copyright, database rights, design rights, domain names, know-how, patents and trade marks. Our intellectual property lawyers have a wealth of experience advising on the full range of intellectual property rights in a superyacht context, including the management, protection, exploitation and enforcement of IP, as well as reputation management and privacy issues. Whether you are creating the exterior design of a superyacht or the design of an internal feature of a superyacht, you should consider:
• Whether to license the right to use your IP or to assign the rights in your IP to another party. • How you want to restrict the use of your IP — you must be specific or you risk misuse and infringement. • Who will own the IP — for example if you are only contributing to one aspect of a design, be clear who will own the design and avoid the pitfalls of joint ownership. • What consideration do you want for the use of your IP — is a one-off payment sufficient or do you require payment on an ongoing basis via royalty payments.
• How to protect your IP.
• How you want to use your IP going forward and the extent to which you want to allow third parties to use it.
9
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online