Written by Jeff Aronson We regularly help clients sell patent properties to “monetize” them, with the patent troll community as the typical buyers. Clients are often excited about the prospects of getting a large future payment, under the rightful (or sometimes mistaken) belief that their patented inventions are very valuable and worth millions (or more). … Continue Reading
Written by Isabel DeObaldia A client this week asked me to help him with a source code license. What started as a simple request with crafting a paragraph inevitably grew due to the concept of “blocking intellectual property.” While I would argue that the document is still “simple” in structure, for the non-initiated it now … Continue Reading
Written by Sanjay Beri I was recently reminded that the term “reseller” agreement can often mean different things to different people. Misunderstandings about these types of relationships creates the potential for miscommunication and wasted time drafting the wrong terms. A client recently asked me for a form of reseller agreement to engage resellers to help … Continue Reading
Written by Jeff Aronson In the not too distant past, there was a school of thought that a covenant not to sue (CNTS) had a different legal effect than a patent license in the US. Differences I frequently heard included a CNTS does not run with the patent, a CNTS does not exhaust the grantor’s … Continue Reading
By Paul Rutherford, partner, London The UK Government intends to introduce a 25% “diverted profits tax” (DPT) from 1 April 2015. The tax is designed to catch the artificial erosion of the UK corporate tax base by multi-nationals that avoid establishing a fixed place of business here in the UK (a “permanent establishment” or “PE”) … Continue Reading
Written by Mark Lehberg We have been working on a number of private company mergers and acquisitions transactions this year where the technology and the intellectual property of the target company (the “Target”) are the key value drivers for the transaction. It is always surprising when the Target has not used “good housekeeping” with regard … Continue Reading
By Florence Guthfreund-Roland & Mathilde Hallé On April 10, 2014, the Court of First Instance of Paris found that VIAGOGO, a Swiss company operating a website selling sports tickets on the Internet, had no right to sell tickets for a French soccer game organized by the French Professional Soccer League. On that basis, the Swiss … Continue Reading
Written by Vicky Lee Ever since the GPLv2 was released in 1991, lawyers and software professionals have analyzed its terms, blogged about them and argued about them. Interpretations of GPLv2 have evolved over the years and there is a consistent pace of enforcement actions by the Software Freedom Law Center. There have been cases interpreting … Continue Reading
Written by Andrew L. Deutsch, Marc E. Miller and Melissa A. Reinckens FOLLOWING LOSS BEFORE THE SUPREME COURT, AEREO “ASTONISHES” BROADCASTERS WITH NEW LEGAL STRATEGY Shortly after its highly publicized loss before the US Supreme Court, which appeared to doom its over-the-air television Internet streaming business, New York-based Aereo shifted to a new legal strategy which it hopes … Continue Reading
Deal fatigue is a real issue — and something you will immediately understand if your job includes negotiations on a single contract that last months or even years. When I say deal fatigue, I mean the situation where people get so tired of a project that they start compromising on issues just to reach the conclusion or … Continue Reading
Negotiations related to gross negligence and willful misconduct seem to be trending this past fall. So, I thought I’d take this opportunity to revisit what these phrases actually mean in the context of commercial contracting. In many agreements, gross negligence and willful misconduct are “carve-outs” in the limitation on liability provision. What do I mean by a “carve-out” on … Continue Reading
