As part of our Anti-Counterfeiting practice, we provide anti-counterfeiting and trademark piracy services.

Counterfeit goods cause billions of dollars of losses each year to brand owners. Often, the more successful a brand, product, or service becomes, the more it is targeted by counterfeiters. In addition to direct monetary losses, trademark piracy and counterfeiting can lead to harm to reputation and goodwill. Thus, a company’s reputation hinges on its ability to protect its brand and prevent misuse of its trademarks through counterfeiting.

Our attorneys work closely with clients to develop effective trademark piracy anti-counterfeiting enforcement and misappropriation programs.

Brand Protection and Anti-Counterfeiting Enforcement

Companies invest significant money and effort to establish and build their brands. Therefore, protecting those valuable intellectual property rights from exploitation is important. Misuse of intellectual property (IP) can take on various forms, such as:

Counterfeit Goods
Trademark Piracy
Sales of Gray Market Goods
Copyright Infringement
Trademark Infringement

This misappropriation of IP rights can cause considerable economic loss of profits and market share by the brand owner. They can also cause harm by tarnishing the brand image, as counterfeits and pirated goods are often of inferior quality. These issues have become a growing challenge for brand owners in the global economy with the ease of Internet sales. Counterfeiting often has an international scope, with China being a particularly popular location for counterfeit manufacture and trademark piracy. We understand the importance of our clients’ brands and the significant impact counterfeiting has on these valuable assets.

Working closely with our clients, we develop effective anti-counterfeiting counter measures and strategies. We then implement and execute enforcement programs in line with clients’ primary objectives. As part of our trademark piracy and anti-counterfeiting enforcement programs, we:

Conduct Investigations
Monitor for Counterfeiting and Trademark Piracy
Record Trademarks and other IP Rights with U.S. Customs and Border Patrol
Trademark Monitoring and Watch Services
Defensive Trademark Registration in First-To-File Countries
Social Media Monitoring and Enforcement

Additionally, we partner with a network of foreign associates around the world to identify and take legal action against counterfeiters. We also help to identify and shut down manufacturers of counterfeit goods in and outside the U.S. Our trademark lawyers help manage anti-counterfeiting enforcement efforts globally to stop or at least minimize counterfeiting and trademark piracy.

Gray Market Goods and Trademark Piracy

Trademark counterfeiting can seriously affect a company’s impact in certain local or nationwide markets regardless of the piracy’s scale. Gray market goods (or parallel imports) can also have a significant negative impact on the value of a brand. These goods are genuine branded goods obtained from one market, imported and sold into another market without the consent of the trademark owner. Gray market diversion undercuts the price of the branded goods through sale at a lower price. This subsequently reduces the revenue the trademark owner could have achieved as well as confuses market value pricing. Parallel imports can also cause damage to a brand’s goodwill and reputation as well as cause issues surrounding consumer protection.

Our attorneys help companies develop anti-counterfeiting enforcement plans to combat the manufacture and sale of counterfeit and gray market goods. We offer targeted, proactive trademark piracy and anti-counterfeiting solutions designed to help clients prevent and eliminate counterfeiting, providing critical protection for their brands.

Brand and Trademark Piracy

Brands often constitute a significant part of corporate value. A company’s brand serves to indicate origin and certify quality, as well as to establish, expand, and maintain market standing. However, successful brands soon find imitators, and brand owners are faced with the negative impacts of brand piracy.

Brand piracy includes naming a product similarly to a well-known brand so that consumers may mistake it for the actual brand name. Commonly known as “knock-offs,” these products can infringe various IP rights of a company including its trademarks. Brand and trademark piracy can quickly cripple and even destroy the brands that companies spent years and millions of dollars building and protecting.

Development of a comprehensive IP portfolio to protect the most important products of a company is an important measure against product and brand piracy. Our trademark attorneys are experienced in global trademark portfolio management and enforcement. We assist clients in proactively monitoring against brand and trademark piracy. For example, we send cease and desist letters, request self audits in lieu of litigation, file preliminary injunctions, as well as litigation. In addition we work with customs authorities in effective in border seizures and counterfeit product destruction. Our trademark attorneys work with clients to tailor strategies that help combat brand and trademark piracy to protect their image and brand from tarnishment.