PRACTICE AREAS

According to the 2020 edition of the "White Paper on Small and Medium Enterprises" published by the Small and Medium Enterprise Agency, the number of openings for startup companies had risen from 87,916 to 118,811.

Also, loans to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) was below 300 trillion yen in 2010, but will rise to nearly 360 trillion yen by 2020, and such indicators suggest that modern investors and banks are paying close attention to SMEs, including startups.

On the other hand, the Japan Fair Trade Commission published an interim report about market research on startup business practices on June 30, 2020. The “Fact-finding Survey on Startup Trading Practices Interim Report”, announced that there is a lack of intellectual property rights in transactions with other companies (large corporations).

With respect to joint development agreements, license agreements, and PoC (Proof-of-Classification) agreements that are significantly related to property, we have the right to enter into joint development agreements with other companies e.g. where a large company has applied for a patent on its technology without permission or is beyond the scope of a contract. 14% of companies have experienced a situation where they have been subjected to the practice of obtaining design rights, etc. without permission from the government.

In addition, the number of IPR-related problems in startups has risen to 4.8%. We have a wealth of experience and know-how in resolving intellectual property disputes and drafting contracts.

We have considerable experience and know-how in resolving intellectual property disputes and drafting contracts. We also have lawyers with experience as auditors. Therefore, we are not just a regular law firm that only provide startup support with no experience in intellectual property disputes. Conversely, such experiences can be used against other companies, including giving advice on how to prevent disputes concerning intellectual property. We can provide legal services for startups with a particularly strong emphasis on intellectual property.

Even if you develop a great technology and try to develop it as a brand, we can help you to obtain patent rights so that all of your efforts will not be in vain if your trademark and other rights are taken away. In order to prevent such a situation from occurring, it is important to obtain the rights during the seed stage.

Yukio Kobayashi serves as a director of the Japan Patent Attorneys Association (JPAA), and the firm provides training and other services to the JPAA. Mr. Kobayashi is a frequent lecturer at the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) and the National Institute of Health Sciences (NIHS) and has worked with various patent attorneys on a variety of litigation and other matters.

Our firm has numerous relationships with patent attorneys with expertise in a variety of fields, which allows us to provide our clients with superior technological advice. We are able to provide opinions on intellectual property rights for startup companies with ideas that need to be protected in collaboration with patent attorneys.