Overview
– IAM Patent 1000
Your intellectual property (IP) assets, including patents, trade secrets, brands, copyrightable works, data compilations, software code, and proprietary technology, are a crucial component of any business transaction involving your company.
Our IP transactions and licensing team is by your side, whether you are considering an IP sale, acquisition, or license, or you are involved in a restructuring, merger, spin-off, or financing. We understand the legal considerations of these complex transactions, as well as the nuances of this industry and other business considerations.
Our approach
We advocate relentlessly on your behalf through all stages of a transaction, including negotiations at the deal table. Our approach includes:
- Handling IP-related due diligence and partnering with clients to identify potential solutions before moving to the next phase of the deal
- Bringing deep technical understanding and sharp business acumen to licensing agreements, restructurings, integrations, and other strategic transactions involving IP
- Advising on the IP components of mergers, acquisitions, and sales of privately and publicly owned companies and the formation of joint ventures while striving to complete the deal on time and within budget.
Who we represent
McDermott’s IP team operates across industries and geographies to bring you a winning combination of experience and knowledge. Strategic collaborations with the firm’s leading corporate, tax, health & life sciences, and regulatory practices ensure our comprehensive support. We focus on providing highly skilled, insightful counsel involved in the licensing of IP assets across various sectors, including:
- Financial services
- Consumer products
- Health and life sciences
- Media, entertainment, and sports
- Technology
- Universities and research institutions
Capabilities
Our IP services cover the full spectrum of transactions and agreements, ensuring your assets are strategically managed and leveraged for maximum value.
- Standalone IP transactions: We represent clients in standalone IP transactions, including acquisitions, investments, licenses, strategic alliances, joint ventures, collaborations, royalty buy-outs, and technology transfer agreements. Our IP lawyers have decades of experience performing due diligence on both the investor and company side, negotiating deal terms, advising on the impact of pending or threatened third-party disputes, and drafting documents for various transactions.
- Collaborative deals: Collaborating with McDermott’s corporate, tax, and regulatory practices, we handle sophisticated transactions involving key IP assets. Our IP lawyers often take a lead role at the deal table, understanding the unique perspectives of stakeholders to negotiate terms that meet our clients’ business goals. When you need critical IP issues weighed appropriately in a deal setting (which may include ongoing third-party disputes or threatened litigation), we excel at communicating these complexities to executive teams, boards of directors, and other internal stakeholders.
- Strategic commercial agreements: We advise our clients on a broad range of commercial contracts, including marketing and distribution agreements, license agreements, and service agreements, as well as clinical, manufacturing, and supply agreements.
- Name, image, and likeness agreements: Our team has a sophisticated understanding of the right of publicity and right to privacy issues and considerations related to the use of a person’s name, image, and likeness in branding. We frequently advise our clients on rights of publicity licensing matters for new partnerships and endorsements.
- Complex licensing: IP can be a source of revenue that expands profitability at limited additional expense. Working closely with the firm’s international tax and corporate advisory practices, our lawyers provide guidance to clients on the global IP aspects of high-profile transactions and restructurings.
