The field of intellectual property law covers industrial property, copyright and the inventor's personal rights. While copyright and the inventor's personal rights are rights that automatically arise at the time of the creation of a work by the originator, industrial property rights are rights that generally arise only after registration or grant, or for the arising of which special criteria such as a commercial reputation is required.

The main types of industrial property rights are the technical IP rights, patents and utility models, for the protection of inventions, trademarks and registered designs. In addition, there are some special IP rights that are part of our range of services, such as the plant variety rights and a small part of copyright. A classical field of advice for patent attorneys, on the other hand, are the law on employee inventions and the civil law of licence agreements and other contracts concerning industrial property rights. You can find more information on these fields of law in this submenu, from which you can also select below using the hex buttons.

Industrial property rights are important instruments of corporate governance.

IP tights serve to secure the results of research and development and also as marketing instruments to distinguish one's own products or services from those of other competitors. A forward-looking intellectual property rights policy creates the competitive advantage of being able to exclusively use one's own inventions, designs and trademarks, to prohibit third parties from using them and thus to restrict the freedom of competitors.

In Germany, patent attorneys are authorised to provide legal advice and to represent clients before the relevant authorities, namely the German Patent and Trade Mark Office (DPMA), the Federal Office of Plant Varieties (BSA), the Federal Patent Court (BPatG) and in patent invalidity proceedings before the Federal Court of Justice (BGH). In the field of copyright law, which is otherwise reserved for laywers, patent attorneys may act before the German Patent and Trade Mark Office, for example in the registration of pseudonymous works. Internationally, patent attorneys act before the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and – after special admission – before the European Patent Office (EPO), the EU authorities EUIPO and CPVO, and the Unified Patent Court of the European Union (UPC). In addition, German patent attorneys are authorised to represent clients before the Czech Arbitration Court at the Economic Chamber of the Czech Republic and the Agricultural Chamber of the Czech Republic (SOUD) in cases based on trademark law regarding EU domains.