Two things that changed the world were worked out in Leicester: DNA fingerprinting, discovered at the University of Leicester in the 1980s, and the geographical protection that stops a pie made outside the Melton Mowbray area being sold under that name. Both are intellectual property, and both show how wide the subject is. An IP solicitor in Leicester may spend one morning on a university licensing deal and the next on a fashion graduate from De Montfort University whose designs have appeared on a fast-fashion website.
The city's industries keep the work varied. Knitwear and clothing manufacturers rely on unregistered design right and copyright in their patterns. Food producers, from the crisp factory at Beaumont Leys to the pie makers of the county, build their businesses on trade marks and recipes kept as trade secrets. Space Park Leicester and the engineering firms around it generate patents, and the games and software developers in the Cultural Quarter need licences, contributor agreements and terms that keep ownership of their code.
A solicitor's part is to identify which rights exist, register trade marks and designs with the UK Intellectual Property Office, draft the licences, assignments and confidentiality agreements that let rights be used safely, and act when they are copied. Patent drafting is usually left to a patent attorney, with the solicitor handling the contracts and any dispute. Infringement claims from Leicester are heard in the Business and Property Courts in Birmingham or in the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court in London, where costs are capped and damages limited to £500,000; most never get past a letter before action and a negotiated licence.
Trade mark filings and standard agreements are generally charged at fixed fees, infringement work by the hour.
Intellectual property firms around Leicester are listed below, those we have verified first. Read what intellectual property law covers, our guide to IP solicitors, and see business law solicitors in Leicester or IP solicitors in Birmingham.
