Intellectual property

Two of the three Decrees adopted on September 29, 2017 in furtherance of the Law for a digital Republic came into force on January 1, 2018. This provides the opportunity to recall the new transparency and fairness requirements imposed on operators of digital platforms. Since January 1, 2018 new requirements apply to some websites, as […]

Business reorganizations or acquisitions of companies often require the performance of a legal due diligence on the target in order to get the most complete picture of it. The due diligence process typically includes a series of investigations, including with respect to the intellectual property titles held by the target (portfolio of intellectual property rights) […]

Registration, as a trademark of the title belonging to a profession regulated by public authorities is contrary to public policy provisions. Such a registration can be cancelled. On the other hand, it may not form the subject of an ownership claim. This is the principle set out by the Cour de cassation (French Supreme Court) […]

In a case concerning the music Just because of you, the theme song of the French movie Les bronzés font du ski, the Cour de Cassation (French Supreme Court) reversed its case-law in a decision handed down on July 3, 2013. Specifically, the Cour de Cassation ruled that “while the moral rights of a performing […]

The surge in the purchases of blank recording media (phones, external or multimedia hard drives, CD-Rs, DVD-Rs, USB devices, memory cards, GPSs, tablets, etc.) by French consumers has recently revealed the profound inadequacy of the French legislation on private copying remuneration.  The French distributors of such media as well as the company responsible for collecting […]

In a decision dated July 12, 2012[1], the First Civil Chamber of the Cour de Cassation (French Supreme Court) held that the Google Suggest tool, that guides Internet users to sites proposing the illegal downloading of works protected by copyright, “provided the means to infringe copyright and related rights”. Google’s search engine does not simply […]