As we ring in 2023, sip some champagne and make a resolution to check in on your trademark portfolio more often.  It misses you! Here are a few productive questions to ask: Do your registrations cover your reality?  You may have launched new brands or drastically redesigned your logo since you last interacted with the USPTO.  Or perhaps your business has expanded or evolved, and the scope of your registrations ignores some now-crucial products or services.  Maybe your filings are all in the US, but the EU and Brazil have become major markets for you.  If any of this ..read more

Ethical duties are paramount in any legal practice. Matters relating to copyright, trademark and advertising law give rise to some special ethical considerations. Even unintentional missteps can be detrimental to the attorney, and their client. In this 60-minute webinar, designed for in-house counsel, we discussed how to identify and address ethical issues to guard against potentially irreversible consequences. Topics Oaths filed with the Patent and Trademark Office, and who should sign them Rules of the road for investigating competitors Who, exactly, is “the client”? Non-lawyer staff member ..read more

Business is booming for cannabis ventures, but the legal landscape for brand protection and product advertising is rife with complications that demand special consideration. Companies should be paying attention to these issues out of the gate. Foley Hoag presented a webinar covering a range of topics related to cannabis trademark protection and promotion of cannabis-related goods and services, including: Maximizing trademark rights at the federal and state level Leveraging alternative IP strategies for brands Advertising best practices and what not to say FDA regulation of cannabis and cannab ..read more

Who said there’s no looking back? It is crucial to consider key takeaways from the most important IP cases from 2021 when planning for 2022. Foley Hoag presented a 60-minute webinar on Tuesday, February 1, 2022, offering guidance on what we learned last year and what to prepare for in the new year. Our speakers focused on developments in trademark, copyright, patent and trade secret law.  Speakers Peter Sullivan, Partner, Foley Hoag LLP Scott Pierce, Partner, Foley Hoag LLP Francisco Cabrera López, Associate, Foley Hoag LLP The post WEBINAR: Top IP Cases in 2021 In-House Counsel Need to Kno ..read more

What does the generalist in-house counsel need to know about copyright? While patents and trademarks often receive the lion’s share of an organization’s intellectual property focus, copyrights comprise a critical third prong to a healthy overarching IP strategy – even for companies whose products and services involve little or no content creation. Foley Hoag LLP presented a webinar offering guidance for in-house counsel regarding copyright law, including the basics of U.S. copyright protection and registration, copyright disputes, and the interplay among copyright, the internet, and emerging t ..read more

Social media platforms present countless opportunities for companies looking to connect to consumers and clients in real time. But, like so much else in our connected age, these opportunities come with a host of risks ranging from minor public relations blips to unpleasant regulatory run-ins with government agencies, and from DMCA takedowns to right of publicity lawsuits. Foley Hoag will present a 60-minute webinar offering guidance on social media issue spotting for in-house legal practitioners, with a focus on intellectual property, publicity rights and advertising. Topics to Be Discussed ..read more

Product configuration and packaging play an integral part in consumer choice and can often set a particular product apart from its competition on the store shelf. Because companies heavily invest in creating unique product designs and packaging that encourage brand association, business owners should also consider protecting those investments as intellectual property. This webinar offers guidance for in-house counsel regarding the different types of intellectual property that may protect product configurations and packaging in the United States, and the interplay among these different forms ..read more

Your company has invested in developing its goodwill and protecting its brands, and now seeks to bring in partners. Or perhaps your company seeks to grow by on-boarding third-party brands. Trademarks form a key asset in many business transactions, but overlooking important details and traps for the unwary can lead to unintended consequences. In this one-hour webinar, we cover the fundamentals of protecting trademark rights in the context of an array of transactions, including: Assignments Licenses Due diligence for mergers and acquisitions Co-branding agreements Bankruptcy Learn the essentia ..read more

Looking Back to Look Ahead Who said there’s no looking back? It is crucial to consider key takeaways from the most important IP cases from 2020 when planning for 2021. Foley Hoag will present a 60-minute webinar on Tuesday, February 9, 2021, offering guidance on what we learned last year and what to prepare for in the new year. Our speakers will focus on 2020 developments in trademark, copyright, patent and trade secret law. Speakers: Peter Sullivan, Partner, Foley Hoag LLP N. Scott Pierce, Partner, Registered Patent Attorney, Foley Hoag LLP Jennifer Yoo, Associate, Foley Hoag LLP ..read more

The decade-long dispute between Google LLC and Oracle America Inc. has now ended with the Supreme Court ruling 6-2 in favor of Google.  This dispute concerned Google’s use of Oracle’s “declaring code” – software that provides a list of functions and definitions that specify the parameters of application program interfaces (APIs) – in Google’s Android operating system.  APIs allow different software programs to work together.  In creating Android, Google used its own implementing code, but in order to allow developers to write their own programs for the Androi ..read more