Intellectual Property

Intellectual Property

The ability to protect intellectual property rights is often the key to maintaining competitive advantage in a changing marketplace. In today's information-based economy, a company's most valuable asset often is its intellectual property, whether patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, or the highly skilled minds which walk out the door each evening. The IP Group sees intellectual property as a "seamless web" in which the overriding goal must be the continuing and sustainable commercial success of the client in the marketplace and, if necessary, in the courthouse.

Comprehensive IP Services

Gordon & Rees provides a variety of IP-related services to a diverse group of national and international clients. In addition to the traditional IP components of patents, trademark and trade dress, and copyright, the IP Group is expert in trade secrets, internet-related issues, rights of privacy, and issues of unfair competition and antitrust, as well as regulatory compliance.

We have extensive experience working with creative companies, and are experts in crafting and implementing cost-efficient enforcement programs to protect IP rights. We are highly experienced and skilled at negotiating and drafting development, licensing, distribution, joint venture, strategic alliance, and vendor services agreements. The IP Group assists clients in identifying, securing, asserting and defending all aspects of IP rights at home and abroad, as well as audits and counseling in crafting long-term strategies to maximize IP assets.

Dispute Resolution

The IP Group specializes in dispute resolution including, where necessary, both litigation and alternative dispute resolution methods such as arbitration and mediation. Our IP practice attorneys have extensive trial, mediation and arbitration experience in both state and federal courts, before the American Arbitration Association and other mediation forums, as well as international arbitration. In addition, we regularly undertake prosecution and administrative proceedings before the Patent and Trademark Office, Copyright Office, and Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, as well as foreign bodies through correspondent counsel. Our IP attorneys are distinguished in having extensive and successful jury trial experience; we do not just push paper, we win cases.

Global Reach

It is the rare industry or business today that stops at the water's edge. The global economy and free flow of information are critical to business in the 21st century. Yet for the most part, intellectual property remains strictly territorial in nature to each jurisdiction, although international cooperation and reciprocal recognition of prior rights is gaining ground. An understanding of foreign markets and non-U.S. intellectual property regimes is important in giving legal advice in this field.

The IP Group brings that understanding and expertise to bear. Members have IP prosecution experience and professional affiliations in numerous foreign jurisdictions, including the Pacific Rim, Canada, Latin America, and Europe, as well as various foreign language capabilities. We are also familiar with the interplay of trade agreements such as NAFTA, TRIPS (Trade-Related intellectual Property Rights), and other international protocols on the enforcement of IP rights abroad and in the United States, including the various Hague Conventions, as well as efforts to harmonize IP rights worldwide, through the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and more specialized multilateral treaties.

Industry Leadership

Members of our IP practice are active participants in professional organizations, including the Licensing Executives Society, the International Trademark Association, the American Intellectual Property Law Association, the Software Development Forum, the Software and Internet Council, and the Intellectual Property Law Sections of the ABA and the Defense Research Institute.

Representative Matters

For a list of representative matters, please click here
For recently issued patents, please click here