Intellectual Property Litigation
Our Intellectual Property Litigation Practice Area is a spin-off from our rich heritage in intellectual property practice which spans over thirty years of collective experience. We have instituted and prosecuted several IP rights protection and enforcement cases for blue chip companies and have obtained Anton Pillar orders of search and seizure with which we hit infringers “below the belt” and constrain them to the negotiation table, thereby saving the clients the time, labour and cost associated with long drawn court cases.
Relevant Experience
- Represents a major telecommunication company in prosecuting intellectual property right enforcement litigations against offenders dealing in importation, marketing, sale and distribution of counterfeits of its mobile telephones and accessories in Nigeria.
- Represented a leading American multinational conglomerate and its Nigerian
- Joint Venture company in three (3) different civil suits involving the protection and defence of its trademarks, trade name and brand name in Nigerian;
- Representing a US international banking group in protecting its trademark against infringement by a group of Nigerian companies.
- Advised and represented a third-party content provider for mobile telecommunication networks in Nigeria in a landmark case on patentability of telecommunications lottery.
- Advised and represented a multinational airline carrier company on claims pertaining to copyright infringement action.
- Acted on behalf of a US cosmetic manufacturer in successfully appealing the adverse ruling of the Registrar of Trademark in respect of offending trademarks. Obtained a court final judgement revoking five unlawful trademark applications.
Anti-Counterfeiting
The Anti-Counterfeiting Practice functions between the firm’s Intellectual Property and Litigation/Dispute Resolution Practice Groups. It is designed to execute specialised anti-counterfeiting campaigns to meet the particular challenges of each client. These assignments are carried out by a dedicated team of expert lawyers, paralegals and investigators with practical experience on the field.
To continually meet needs of our clients in combating the challenges posed by the dynamism of the counterfeiters, our Anti-Counterfeiting Team has evolved several effective means within the ambit of the law (other than traditional civil litigation) of dealing with the menace of counterfeiting
The firm’s Anti-Counterfeiting services include, but are not limited to the following:
- Extensive on-site investigations at known addresses where counterfeiting and other forms of illicit trades are carried out in any part of Nigeria and the West African sub-region
- Market survey of known markets where counterfeit products are sold and distributed, with a view to determining the source of manufacture or importation;
- Investigative trademark searches at the Trademarks Registry
- Administrative actions at the Corporate Affairs Commission in relation to the conflict between company names and trademarks;
- Obtaining Anton Pillar orders and injunctions;
- Organising and conducting Police raids in the markets and at locations of suspected dealers in counterfeits, with a view to seizure and destruction of offending products and prosecution of offenders;
- Combating parallel imports;
- Negotiating amicable settlement and extracting relevant written non-violation Undertakings from offenders;
- Organising awareness/sensitization campaigns in the markets.
Trademarks Opposition
We have a team dedicated to protecting clients’ trademarks by opposing the registration of any conflicting trademarks or defending any opposition against client’s trademarks at the Nigerian Trademarks Registry. We are quite experienced in prosecuting trademark cancellations both at the Registry and in the regular courts, and have handled upwards of a thousand trademark opposition cases and cancellation actions.
The firm’s Trademark Opposition practice includes the following services:
- Trademark Journal Watch Service
- Advising on chances of successfully defending or opposing trademark applications
- Initiating trademark opposition actions against off ending trademark applications
- Defending trademark opposition actions
- Drafting petitions and making representations before the Registrar of Trademarks;
- Negotiating amicable settlement between opposing parties;
- Extracting written undertakings from offenders to refrain from infringing on clients’ Intellectual Property rights.
