Intellectual Property Protection and Licensing

Secure Your Intellectual Property & Close IP Deals

SVLG works with technology companies to protect and monetize their valuable intellectual property. Our clients span a wide variety of industries, including software, semiconductor, capital equipment, communications, cloud computing, networking, Internet of Things, robotics, artificial intelligence, natural resources, agriculture, manufacturing, and distribution. We also represent clients in the financial service industries whose businesses are facilitated by technology and impacted by its misuse.

What Happens When Businesses Fail to Protect Their Intellectual Property

Intellectual property theft happens every day in the Silicon Valley. Employees walk out the door with source code, designs, software and hardware specifications, marketing plans, and customer lists. They then start a new business to compete against their former employers. We have heard the same story from many clients over the years. If you are reading this page, you may be experiencing the same thing.

Another common scenario involves protecting trademarks — business and product names, logos, slogans, and other aspects of your brand. If you don’t pursue protection, other businesses can copy your trademarks and perhaps stand in the way of your protecting them at a later time. Failing to register your trademarks promptly, especially in foreign countries, may mean you will lose your rights.

How we Help our Clients Protect Their Intellectual Property

We help clients prevent intellectual property theft, but if it does occur, we can take prompt action to put a stop to it. With trade secret protection, we help clients establish effective programs for protecting vital company secrets. We go beyond the usual advice from more traditional lawyers, who limit their advice to using confidentiality agreements, password protection, and locks on filing cabinets. Our attorneys can help you with sophisticated information security programs with the help of data security firms we work with. Yes, we can help with traditional confidentiality agreements and procedures for protecting intellectual property. But our services include technical and detailed policies, procedures, practices, and technology in coordination with data security consulting firms.

If someone does steal your intellectual property, and if you obtain prompt legal help, our firm can help you by seeking a court order on your behalf to have the bad actors stop their trade secret theft. We may be able to resolve these claims by seeking money from the bad actors. With these kinds of claims, the most important thing is to seek help right away. The passage of time makes it harder to seek relief later.

With trademarks, we can seek federal registrations for your trademarks to obtain nationwide protection. We can oversee your brand protection program to make sure you are obtaining the right protections without overspending on needless registrations. If you need foreign registrations, our firm can coordinate with counsel in other countries. Our firm is a member of the International Network of Boutique and Independent Law Firms, which is a global network of law firms in major markets around the world. If you need trademark counsel in a foreign country, it may be that one of INBLF’s international affiliates can assist in seeking protection on your behalf in that country.

Overview of Services

• Trade Secret – We help clients develop and enforce confidentiality, non-disclosure, invention assignment and trade secret agreements and programs. We offer a unique perspective of understanding the role of administrative, physical, and technical information security controls in protecting trade secrets.
• IP Transfer & Licensing – We have broad experience in drafting and negotiating technology transactions, transfers, and licensing agreements, both domestic and international. These include technology development, OEM, VAR, marketing and distribution agreements as well as related joint ventures.
• Trademark & Copyright – We counsel on variety of trademark and copyright issues, including registration and assignment.
• IP Litigation – Our Business Litigation Group has a solid record of prosecuting and defending all types of IP-related actions in federal and state court, often including infringement claims and related business torts, as well as matters involving the Uniform Trade Secret Act, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, and the Electronic Communications Privacy Act.

If you need some immediate assistance to address an urgent situation, please contact us right away by calling us at (408) 573-5700 or by completing the contact form on the right side of this page.

If your needs are not urgent, but you just want to explore how your business can protect its intellectual property, please contact us to set up a phone call. One of us would be glad to speak with you (without obligation) about what you are trying to do and to see if can be of help to you.