Lawyer Monthly - November 2021 Edition

60 WWW.LAWYER-MONTHLY.COM | NOV 2021 INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY - IP DISPUTES IN A PR-LED WORLD up on the case again and how it still nearly crippled the poor family-owned business. Part of the difficulty in a case like PUREOATY, however, is that a case which is based on knowingly getting too close to the claimant is often difficult. If you have a history of copying (like some of the supermarkets) then it is an easy jump to make in pleadings, but where there has been no history of copying, to rely upon it is not an allegation that can always be reasonably made: this leaves the defendant to craft a narrative of a bullying claimant. Equally, trying to force a party in that position to make pre-action disclosure of how they came to a design can be an expensive experiment. Where (as in OATLY/PUREOATY) the case is being brought in the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court with lower recoverability of legal costs and damages, bringing challenges and applications which could cost many thousands in irrecoverable costs is not attractive. The key question, however, may be whether – without that – is there the risk of commencing an action without a compelling narrative? With that comes the potential for a PR disaster which will have a much greater loss to the business. Of course, the real strategy is to have a strategy; to know in real terms why you are contesting a third-party trademark or writing that cease and desist. In the world of brand protection, so often the needle swings between no action and frantic action when a brand protection programme starts – perhaps fuelled by seeing profits or opportunities lost to third parties, the business adopts a “zero-tolerance” approach – but mounting legal costs and too many claims often lead the brand owner to scale back to a far smaller band of issues. If there is a strong reasoning for the action taken then a business should be in a much better position from PR; either it will be a case which is easy to explain to the third party as being reasonable, or it will be a case which is important enough to ride out any negative PR storm. PR can be a friend or a foe to legal proceedings. If a party has considered its position carefully and used correspondence and statements of case for the persuasive communications they are, then there should be little to fear. Get the approach incorrect, however, and it is just a matter of time before bad PR will bite. Aaron Wood Trademark Attorney Blaser Mills Law 40 Oxford Road, High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, HP11 2EE Tel: +44 (0) 1494 478 676 E: arw@blasermills.co.uk www.blasermillslaw.co.uk Aaron Wood is a trademark attorney in Blaser Mills’ Corporate and Commercial team. He often works with brand owners, including numerous major UK firms, handling complex IP disputes on their behalf. He has also been ranked among the top 10 advocates in the UK Intellectual Property Office for trademark disputes (by number of appearances). Blaser Mills Law is a full-service law firm based in the UK. Over its 130-year history, the firm has offered a comprehensive range of services to individuals, SMEs and blue chip companies, regularly advising UK companies doing business overseas and international companies looking to invest in the UK.