Intellectual Property (IP) law in most of West and Central Africa is defined and laid down by the African Intellectual Property Organisation (AIPO) which was created by the Bangui Agreement of March 2, 1977 as revised on February 24, 1999 and December 14, 2015 at Bamako. The AIPO is comprised of 17 member states including Cameroon, Comoros Islands, and other French-speaking West and Central African countries. The OAPI zone is a market of 183 million consumers. The seat of the organisation is Yaoundé, Cameroon. While the Bangui Treaty and its annexes & administrative regulations regulate intellectual property law, the collective management of copyright and related rights is entrusted to member states who administer national systems of collecting societies.

The OAPI has ratified several international treaties relating to the protection, maintenance and enforcement of copyright and related rights, patents, trademarks, industrial designs, unfair competition amongst other rights related to intellectual property. As an OAPI licensed industrial property agent firm, we provide a variety of intellectual property law services including, but not limited to:

 

  • Legal Consulting and Advisory Services.
  • Conducting legal research work on IP subject matters, including, patents, utility models, trademarks, industrial designs, geographical indications, trade names, unfair competition, new plant varieties protection, lay-out designs (topographies) of integrated circuits and literary and artistic property protection, tort of passing off, criminal infringement of IP rights, etc.
  • Preparing & Filing applications for registration of IP rights subject matters (trademark registration applications, patent prosecution, certificates of addition, utility models, industrial designs, etc).
  • Filing renewals, recordals (recordation), searches, information requests, extensions, corrections, change of agent, etc.
  • Advising clients on the protection and enforcement of their IP rights and IP watch services, involving copyright & related rights, as well as cybersquatting;
  • Drafting IP contracts (license & cross-license contracts, technology transfer contracts, joint ownership contracts, software licensing contracts, non-disclosure agreements, transfer & assignment of IP rights agreements, etc.)
  • Litigating IP cases (oppositions, claims of ownership, restorations, appeals, actions for invalidation or nullity, actions for cancellation based on non-use, criminal infringement of IP rights, customs & border measures in case of seizure of counterfeit products, etc.)
  • IP Watch, Monitoring & Investigation services (internal market monitoring, online brand abuse reporting, patent abuse reporting, trade fair reporting, etc.).
  • Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights (custom protection, etc.) and Alternative Dispute Resolution of IP disputes as counsel and negotiators, mediators-arbitrators.
  • Cybersquatting and Cybercriminality.
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