Nabarro

Nabarro LLP is a London law firm with over 450 lawyers, practising in IP law and other commercial areas, including dispute resolution and corporate.

Practice areas

Nabarro's IP team handles transactions, disputes and strategy relating to all types of intellectual property. The practice has a particular focus on brands and has a fully integrated trademark filing practice. Its clients span all sectors, particularly information technology, retail/fashion, finance, pharmaceuticals and real estate.

Key areas of expertise include:
• trademark enforcement and litigation;
• trademark clearance, filing and oppositions;
• patent litigation;
• copyright and design rights;
• domain name disputes;
• licensing technology, content and trademarks;
• franchising; and
• data protection, confidentiality and privacy.

Much of Nabarro's work has an international flavour; the firm regularly advises UK and overseas enterprises operating in world markets and overseas entities looking to safeguard their interests in the United Kingdom and across Europe. As well as filing UK, Community and international trademark applications and oppositions, Nabarro oversees the protection of its clients’ rights in more than 200 countries.

The practice has a reputation for sound judgement regarding trademark conflicts, diligence, proactivity and innovation in opposition work, and is recognised for helping clients to develop and implement thoughtful strategies for the protection, exploitation and enforcement of trademarks.

Well-known and famous trademarks

Nabarro has particular expertise in handling well-known and famous trademarks, and managing global trademark portfolios and UK/EU enforcement programmes to protect some of the world’s leading brands. These include the major technology and social media companies Twitter and Oracle (including SUN and JAVA brands), and apparel and accessories companies such as Levi Strauss, Samsonite, Pepe Jeans and Hackett. Food and beverage sector clients include Kettle Foods and United Biscuits.

Enforcement and disputes

Nabarro's lawyers handle IP disputes in the English High Court and Patents County Court, the Court of Appeal, the Supreme Court and the European Court of Justice, as well as representing clients in the UK Intellectual Property Office, at the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO). In 2012 our IP team acted for Oracle America in its Supreme Court victory over MTech Data, a case involving the intersection between trademark law and EU 'single market' rules.

Domain name expertise

The firm deals with numerous domain name disputes and its lawyers sit on both the WIPO Domain Name Panel and the appeal board appointed by Nominet UK to determine appeals relating to domain name disputes in the country-code top-level domain ‘.uk’.

Trademark policing programmes

Nabarro has developed innovative trademark policing and enforcement programmes for owners of well-known and famous trademarks. These include making effective use of the UK Company Names Tribunal. The firm has been the most active of all UK law firms in the new tribunal, acting in around one-quarter of the tribunal’s caseload.

Grey market and anti-counterfeiting

Nabarro has extensive experience in greymarket issues, having been influential in the early cases establishing the principles under EU law and subsequently in helping its clients to plan effective grey-market enforcement strategies.

Nabarro handles programmes of this kind for clients in sectors ranging from apparel through musical instruments to computer equipment. The firm also manages anti-counterfeiting programmes, including customs measures and removal of infringing product listings from internet auction sites.

Associations and publications

Members of the team are active in the International Trademark Association (INTA) and MARQUES, finding their work on INTA committees and MARQUES teams stimulating and valuable. Louise Gellman is the 2011/12 chair of the INTA Madrid System Sub-committee, while Ian Lowe is chair of the MARQUES Anti-counterfeiting and Parallel Trade Team, and organised MARQUES’s seminar on parallel trade in January 2011. Guy Heath is on the editorial board of INTA’s The Trademark Reporter. Nabarro lawyers regularly contribute to industry publications and frequently lecture on trademark and IP topics in Europe and the United States.