It was a real pleasure to speak on IP insurance at the Chartered Institute of Trade Mark Attorney’s spring conference which took place at the Waldorf Astoria in London recently. I caught up with friends and ex-colleagues and really enjoyed talking IP with people from around the world.
The audience was predominently made up of over 200 trade mark attorneys and a number of the talks focussed on recent developments in UK and EU trade mark and design law. These updates are important to keep abreast of how the law can affect clients .
My presentation focussed on how to mitigate the cost risk of trade mark litigation through the use of trade mark insurance. Specifically, the reasons why before the event cover is preferable to after the event insurance and third party funding, why the market for before the event IP insurance is growing rapidly, what the policies cover and how much they cost.
All the talks were immortalised in a great cartoon that artist, Caroline Chapple created during the course of the day. As you can see from the thumbnail, it really is a work of genius. I am depicted fighting off a scary trade mark infringer with a club, which just about sums it up.
IP insurance is now piquing the interest IP owners and the IP community and, as I said to the attorneys in the room, it is vital that they talk to their client about it because it can add real value to their trade mark portfolios. Most clients will not know IP insurance even exists and so are unaware they can mitigate this significant business risk. Unfortunately, most insurance brokers in the UK (the majority of of whom don’t know their trade marks from their patents) will not be speaking to their clients about this particular type of cover because they do not know enough about it. It therefore falls to to patent and trade mark attorneys to raise it as an option.
Now, IP insurance is not for every client but for those who are worried about the cost of litigation and have asked ‘what is the point of having IP if we cant afford to enforce it?’ they will really appreciate being made aware of the existence of this type of cover.
If you are interested in getting a quote for a client or your own business please give us a call or complete the short form here. The quote will take a day or to to prepare and there is no cost to you.
Thanks for reading!
