Intellectual Property

Sale of “grey” goods in the UK is a criminal offence under the Trade Marks Act 1994

Sale of “grey” goods in the UK is a criminal offence under the Trade Marks Act 1994 Grey market goods/parallel imports are genuinely manufactured goods by the trade mark owner,…

How Not to Have a Counterfeit and Criminal Christmas

How Not to Have a Counterfeit and Criminal Christmas ‘Tis the season of counterfeiting. Intellectual property crime is rife at Christmas. You purchase a product for half the price of…

Briffa Celebrates – Lazy Oaf

#BriffaCelebrates – Lazy Oaf Lazy Oaf is one of our favourite clients who is anything but lazy or oafish. Launched more than 15 years ago by Gemma Shiel, Lazy Oaf…

Acid/Briffa seminar explores alternative design protection through copyright

At a recent ACID and Briffa event following the disappointing Trunki decision (PMS International Limited v Magmatic Limited [2016] UKSC 12), speakers explored IP enforcement in continental Europe and examined…

Improving access to justice – year 1 for the shorter trial pilot scheme

The shorter and flexible trial schemes, two pilot schemes being run in the Chancery Division, were launched last year (1 October 2015) with a view to: 1) achieve shorter and…

The Rubik’s Cube shape trade mark declared invalid

In 1999 Seven Towns successfully registered the Rubik’s cube as a 3D EU trade mark. In 2006, a German toy manufacturer, Simba Toys, applied to cancel the trade mark on…

Briffa Celebrates – Adrienne’s 15 years

  Today we celebrate Adrienne, our Office Queen and Practice Manager for 15 years of dedicated and loyal service to all things Briffa. Adrienne has played a huge role in building…

Donald Trump, Copyright Pirate?

Navigating the world though racial and ethnic stereotyping while landing on an island somewhere near you for the odd grope; it seems Donald Trump can now add Copyright Pirate to…

May the Force be with you (if you have a licence to use the Force …)

The Star Wars brand was born in 1977 with the release of the first film in the series: simply, “Star Wars”. It’s almost 40 years later and if you’re not…

No stopping Pokemon GO!

We’ve all heard about the latest augmented reality game and the impact it’s had on our streets. But what does it mean for the world of IP? The game was…

Fox film studio sued by unpaid interns on Black Swan production 

The class action between Fox and its interns that has been going on since 2010 has finally reached a conclusion. Fox Searchlight Pictures, Inc and Fox Entertainment Group, Inc filed…

Protecting your IP – simple tips

That looks familiar? Simple advice on how to protect what’s yours The recent case of Tuesday Bassen (an illustrator and designer) against Zara (a multi-national fashion designer) reported reecently by…

Virtual currency – legal aspects of Bitcoin

VIRTUAL CURRENCY This week a judge in Florida ruled that Bitcoin is not actually money, stating that Bitcoin was not backed by a government or bank, and was not “tangible…

Intellectual Property Litigation Funding

Litigation Funding Factors to Consider In a 2011 case, clothes designer and Queen of Punk, Vivien Westwood, won a legal battle after the opposing party infringed her intellectual property rights. …

Image Rights – Rihanna

Rihanna’s image is protected under the ‘umbrella’ of passing off The Court of Appeal dismissed Topshop’s appeal, confirming that its sale of the t-shirt bearing Rihanna’s image amounted to passing…

How much are your Intellectual Property Rights worth?

As a business, it is important to consider how much your intellectual property rights are worth. This is not just relevant to business owners who are thinking of selling their…

Right to be forgotten – sometimes…

Google attempts to limit the scope of legislative ruling It’s been reported that Google is appealing to the French High Court to limit the scope of the right to be…

Olympic Athlete Sponsorship Deals and Rule 40

The International Olympic Committee (“IOC”) have relaxed the ban on Olympic athletes lending their name, image or likeness to advertising campaigns around the Olympic Games. The IOC strictly govern advertising…