Services
The services are not limited to IP patent filing activities but go through each step of IP protection
through customized consulting and assistance activities aimed at increasing the competitiveness
of companies through the enhancement of their IP assets.
Trademarks
I am unique and proud of it
A trademark is the first form of communication of a business activity to the public; in fact, it is what differentiates that business activity from its competitors and serves as a compass as it guides consumers in their choice in the marketplace of their products/services.
The first step in protecting a trademark is to obtain its registration at the Trademark Offices located in the territories of commercial interest. Registration grants a long-lasting exclusive right to the chosen naming and/or logo (generally 10 years). After this period has elapsed, the registration can be renewed for identical and successive periods, guaranteeing the relevant owner an exclusive right that tends to be perpetual.
To be registered, a trademark must be original with respect to the product/service distinguished, new with respect to signs already on the registry and/or market in relation to the same or similar business activity, and lawful, that is, not deceptive or contrary to law, public order or morality.
Compared to the mere user, the owner of a registered trademark is decidedly more advantaged in the ways of exercising its protection, in the drafting of commercial exploitation agreements, and also has a solid intangible asset (so-called intangible asset) that contributes to increasing the company’s assets.
ALBAKORA INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY carries out the following activities to protect a trademark:
Design
When aesthetics is everything
With the legal institution of design (so-called industrial design), the aesthetic appearance of a product or a part there of is protected, as resulting in particular from the characteristics of the lines, contours, colors, shape, surface texture and/or materials of the product itself and/or its ornamentation. Specifically, product means any industrial or handicraft object, including but not limited to components that must be assembled to form a complex product, packaging, presentations, graphic symbols and typefaces, excluding computer programs.
To wit: individual garments or entire clothing collections, goldsmith items, furniture elements, even the concept of a store are all creations susceptible to registration as industrial design.
In order to be registered a design must possess novelty such as absence of disclosure at an earlier date (except in special cases), individual character i.e., suitability to arouse in the person skilled in the field (a figure somewhere between the technician in the field and the average consumer and generally understood as a person passionate about the subject who acts consciously) an impression different from that made by other designs already disclosed at an earlier date, and lawfulness i.e., not contrary to public order and morality.
Among the requirements listed above, the assessment of individual character is a controversial and often difficult interpretive activity; useful in this regard is the criterion that in very crowded sectors for the purpose of establishing individual character in the newly found even slight differences in form from what has already been disclosed are considered sufficient, while in freer sectors a greater degree of dissimilarity is required.
The owner of a registered design has an exclusive right to the aesthetics of the creation for 5 years from the filing of the application for registration, a period that can be extended through renewal activities for additional 5-year periods up to a maximum of 25 years.
In special cases, design protection can be cumulated with copyright protection with considerable extension of the temporal duration of the same.
ALBAKORA INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY performs the following activities to protect a design:
Patents
When the idea is brilliant
The technical institution of the patent protects a technological innovation that is susceptible to industrial application and is presented as a new, original and concrete solution to a technical problem.
Through the patent, the owner is granted a right to exclusive use of the new invention for a certain period of time, after which the invention will be permanently acquired by the collective patrimony.
The law does not list the exact type of inventions susceptible to patenting, voluntarily leaving this block open, even considering the changing needs of modern society; however, it expressly excludes from patenting
“discoveries, scientific theories and mathematical methods; plans, principles and methods for intellectual activity, for play or for commercial activity and computer programs; presentations of information”. This prohibition is made clear that it applies provided that such discoveries and software are considered “as such,” and therefore if an invention is made through them, it may be, after appropriate analysis, patented.
The patenting of methods for surgical and therapeutic treatment (as opposed to medical devices) and animal breeds (as opposed to biological processes) is excluded.
In general, industrial inventions, utility models and new plant varieties may be patentable subject matter.
In particular, the patent for industrial invention is the highest form of protection in this regard as it protects solutions to a technical problem that has never been solved before. It lasts for 20 years from the filing of the application. The utility model patent, on the other hand, protects those objects that introduce a change from what already exists resulting in greater utility or ease of use. The duration is 10 years from the filing of the application.
Italian law allows a simultaneous filing of the same application both as a patent for industrial invention and as a utility model, leaving it up to the Italian Patent and Trademark Office (UIBM) to choose between the two.
To be patented, a new invention must be susceptible of industrial reproduction, new, that is, different from what already exists and has not already been disclosed by the same inventor, inventive and therefore capable of bringing a concrete innovation in the relevant field, and finally lawful, that is, in accordance with morality and public order.
ALBAKORA INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY performs the following activities in patent matters:
Copyright
I am pure creativity
Copyright is the legal institution that protects intellectual works having a creative character and belonging, for example, to the field of literature, music, figurative arts, architecture, theater, film, whatever the mode or form of expression. Databases, software, multimedia or digital works also fall within the scope of works protected in this sense.
Unlike with trademarks, designs and patents, copyright arises as a result of the mere creation of the work as long as precisely it has been extrinsic and as long as it is original and new.
By the very effect of the creation, the author has the right to be acknowledged as the father of the same before anyone and to
exploit it economically, either directly or through assignment or licensing agreements in favor of third parties. The author also has the exclusive right to decide on the publication and/or reproduction and/or any modifications, translations of the same.
The rights of economic use last throughout the author’s lifetime and up to 70 years after the author’s death.
To exercise its exclusive rights, the author must possess proof of authorship and the date of creation of the work. There are several tools useful for this purpose (notarized deposit, registered letter A/R, deposit c/o the SIAE).
ALBAKORA INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY performs the following activities to protect authorship rights:
Strategic
consulting
ALBAKORA INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY provides services of consultancy to enhance the value of innovation through:
