Tag: Intellectual Property (IP)

2020 witnessed a dramatic cyber threat landscape from beginning to end. Although the pandemic played a central role, as the year progressed cyber adversaries evolved attacks with increasingly disruptive outcomes. They maximised the expanded digital attack surface beyond the core network, to target remote work or learning, and the digital supply chain.

With only a few weeks till the Brexit transition and having initiated discussions years ago, UK ministers are considering formally doing away with non-compete clauses sooner rather than later. Essentially, removing non-compete clauses allows employees to start their own businesses without having to sit out a waiting period.

In an accelerated digital landscape marked by ever-increasing amounts of data processed every day, information technology practitioners must navigate through multiple information lifecycle management practices daily to ensure the veracity of business data.

Having formally left the European Union (EU) on 31 January 2020, the United Kingdom (UK) is now in the transition period, which allows it to remain part of the EU intellectual property (IP) system until 31 December 2020. That’s only a few weeks away.

The weaknesses inherent in franchised businesses and the health of relationships between franchisor and franchisees are being revealed as the COVID-19 pandemic unfolds. Excessive reliance on retail infrastructure, insufficient investment in digitisation and poor delivery capability is severely impacting franchised networks. 

“If a man (or woman) invents a new article and protects it by a patent, then during the term of the patent, they will of course have a legal monopoly, but when the patent expires all the world may make the article, and if they may make the article they may say that they are making the article, and for that purpose use the name which the patentee has attached to it during the time when he had the legal monopoly of the manufacture.” - Lord Davey in the case of Cellular Clothing Co v Maxton & Murray

Virtual reality has been on the rise in the past years and is a growing and dynamic area of technological advancement and development. In 2020, through necessity, many of us have found ourselves conducting various aspects of our lives, everything from business meetings to birthday parties, through virtual platforms.

This article is based on the Court case (330/2019) [2020] ZASCA 34 (03 April 2020). The taxpayer was engaged in the importation, manufacturing and distribution of alcoholic beverages. The taxpayer entered into an agreement with foreign brand owners for the advertising and promotion of their alcoholic products in South Africa.

An interview with Darren Olivier, Partner Adams & Adams, and Dr Ivor Blumenthal, CEO, ArkKonsult, discussing the legal implications of remote working with respect to an organisation's intellectual property.

This has been a year of disruption, confusion and now a new ‘normal’. COVID-19 is here for the foreseeable future, and that means humans need to adapt to new circumstances like Working from Home (WFH). Almost every industry has embraced this as an effective way of keeping staff safe, remaining operational and controlling costs during global economic downturn.