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The entire MARK & LAW team wishes you a wonderful holiday season!  🎄🎅🥂🎇

When you hear in a conversation about intellectual property and global warming, you think you don’t see the connection. And yet, the link between the two subjects does exist and the latter can have a strong impact on the former. The most obvious example is the summer we just had, an exceptionally hot summer that caused a long drought that continued into the fall. This had an impact on the quantity and quality of fruit and vegetables produced, and this is where intellectual property comes in. Indeed, many of our fruits and vegetables and other regional specialties benefit from protected […]

Selective distribution is a distribution strategy in which the supplier gives the right to a limited number of “authorized” distributors or resellers to sell its goods or services. This distribution strategy is often practiced by luxury brands owners who choose their authorized distributors with care and precision in order to preserve the brand’s luxury market and image. Contrary to what one might think at first glance, selective distribution is not an anti-competitive measure in the sense of competition law. In fact, it is a type of distribution that allows to preserve and even increase the intrinsic qualities of the goods, […]

Registering IP rights with Russian customs to block infringing goods before they enter the country is a very useful provision of Russian legislation against parallel imports; however, some Russian legislators have recently decided otherwise, in reaction to external sanctions due to the current conflict with Ukraine. In order to avoid shortages, the Russian government has decided to accept parallel imports of certain goods without the authorization of their IP rights holders (provided that these products have already been marketed abroad). Thus, a wide range of goods (more or less essential) can be imported into Russia outside the official distribution channels: […]

The adoption of color as a source indicator is becoming more and more evident for companies, especially in the fashion and luxury sectors where color generally contributes to the success of a brand, a symbol of prestige. Indeed, colors play an essential role in the identity of companies, since they have a lasting impact on consumers who will spontaneously associate certain colors with a particular company. Tiffany & Co, Hermès, Christian Louboutin or Milka are good examples, as they are widely recognized by the public through their emblematic colors, and on which they have a trademark right. The same goes […]

The EPO (European Patent Office) and EUIPO (European Union Industrial Property Office) have studied the impact of intellectual property on the economy of the European Union and EFTA countries (Switzerland, Iceland, and Norway) as well as the United Kingdom during 2017/2019. The study defines IPR (Intellectual Property Rights)-intensive industries in the EU economy (i.e., as those having an above-average ownershop of IPRs per employee, as compared with other IPR-using industries), which include manufacturing, technology, and business services. There are 357 high IPR-intensive industries, 4 more than in 2019 for the previous study with two-thirds using IPR heavily and the report’s […]

The CNIL has just issued a new recommendation to control the security of passwords, taking into account the evolution of knowledge and attacks in this area. This update was necessary, given the increased threats to data security and the clear finding of a study conducted by Verizon in 2021, which revealed that more than 80% of global data breach notifications are related to password issues. But what are the risks associated with poor password management? There are four factors to consider: The simplicity of the password, The listening on the network in order to collect the transmitted passwords, Keeping the […]

Is the end of the untimely use of the Haka in sight? Everyone knows the Haka, the Maori war dance popularised by the New Zealand rugby team, the All-Blacks, who perform it at the start of every match. This war dance was invented in the early 1800s by Te Rauparaha, chief of the Ngati Toa tribe, and his heritage is now perpetuated and defended by the Ngati Toadit. In New Zealand, the Haka is truly part of the nation’s cultural heritage, which notably led to the adoption in 2014 of specific legislation to protect the Haka Ka Mate, the “Haka […]

Alan Jay PERLIS, a computer specialist, stated in 1982 that “in man-machine symbiosis, it is man who must adjust: The machines can’t.“. This statement is particularly true today. Indeed, with the development of artificial intelligence, the latter is now capable of generating creations in an almost autonomous way in many fields. We can therefore legitimately ask ourselves whether these creations are eligible to protection by copyright. However, in the current state of copyright law and doctrine, the creator is necessarily a physical person, and this despite the fact that this rule is not expressly stated in the legal texts. Indeed, […]