Welcome to the first 2021 edition of Brand Matters. With the Brexit transition period having ended on 31 December 2020, this edition reviews the impact of the EU/UK deal on intellectual property rights and digital trade, as well as on trade in goods and services more generally. This will involve changes to the way businesses operate, and some steps to take in relation to your intellectual property portfolio are outlined in our short animation.
Away from Brexit, this edition reports on a number of useful decisions for brand owners, providing clarifications on issues such as post-sale confusion in passing off cases, and bait & switch selling. We also look at advertising developments, including an interesting review of ASA cases relating to complaints of gender stereotyping.
Finally, the Mishcon Academy recently launched its Spring Prospectus. The Academy is Mishcon de Reya’s in-house place of learning, our driver for growth and a platform for thought leadership – and was opened up to our clients and contacts in 2020. Last week we were delighted to host Mo Gawdat, former Chief Business Officer for Google X, entrepreneur, and the author of the book Solve for Happy", who spoke about his work on an algorithm for happiness and how we can achieve happiness every day. We have many events coming up, and we would love to see you there - perhaps at our conversation with acclaimed Scottish novelist, screenwriter and playwright William Boyd CBE or our Junior Lawyer Programme sessions on brand protection and on advertising.
Please do get in touch if you have any comments or wish to discuss any of the issues raised in more detail.