Academy
Guides
Plain-English guides to the legal questions our clients ask most.
- Guide · Privacy & Data Protection
AI under Swiss Law and the GDPR: Key Differences
What the revised Swiss FADP and the GDPR mean for companies that build or use AI services: scope, legal bases, impact assessments, transfers, sanctions and the EU AI Act.
- Guide · Intellectual property
Can I Protect My Software?
Software is protected by copyright, sometimes by patent, and by trade secret law. This article explains what each protects, who owns the code, and how the rights combine.
- Guide · Commercial
Commercial Contracts: a Map
The main families of commercial contract, the EU and national rules that frame them, and where risk and value tend to sit.
- Guide · Information Technology
Database Rights and Trade Secrets
How the EU database right, copyright and trade secret law protect data and databases, what each requires, and where contracts must fill the gaps.
- Guide · Commercial
Distribution and Reseller Agreements
How to structure distribution and reseller agreements in the EU: exclusivity, termination protection, online sales, and the brand provisions that keep control.
- Guide · Intellectual property
Domain Name Disputes: the Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy
How a bad-faith domain name can be recovered under the UDRP and URS, and under the separate procedure for .eu names, under country-code procedures, or through the courts.
- Guide · Intellectual property
Finding the IP You Already Have
Most companies own more intellectual property than they have registered. This article explains which rights arise without registration, how an IP audit finds them, and why ownership matters.
- Guide · Patents
Freedom-to-Operate Analysis
What a freedom-to-operate analysis is, how claims are read against a product, what it can and cannot tell you, and what to do when it finds a problem.
- Guide · Corporate and M&A
Funding Rounds: Term Sheets and Investment Agreements
How an equity round for a company in the EU works, the term sheet, what each clause does, the investment and shareholders' agreements, and what investors check first.
- Guide · Tax
Grants and Tax Incentives for IP in Belgium
An overview of the Belgian instruments that lower the cost of creating IP and the tax on the income it earns, and the documents you need before you can claim them.
- Guide · Intellectual property
How to Value an IP Portfolio
Why and when an IP portfolio is valued, the three standard valuation approaches, and the legal facts that decide whether a right is worth what its owner thinks.
- Guide · Corporate and M&A
IP in Due Diligence
What a buyer or investor checks about a company's intellectual property, why chain of title is the most common problem, and how a seller can prepare.
- Guide · Intellectual property
IP Lifecycle Management: the Stages of an IP Right
Every IP right is created, protected, maintained, used and ends one day. The stages of IP lifecycle management, their legal terms and the choices at each.
- Guide · Commercial
Know-How and Technology Transfer Agreements
How to transfer know-how, patents or software to a partner by contract: defining what moves, keeping know-how confidential, and the EU competition rules.
- Guide · Commercial
Licensing Agreements
How to structure an IP licence: scope, royalties, improvements, quality control, termination, and the EU rules that frame it.
- Guide · Corporate and M&A
M&A for Growing Businesses
A practical walk through an M&A deal, share or asset deal, price mechanisms, warranties, change of control and getting from signing to closing.
- Guide · Commercial
Manufacturing and Supply Agreements
What a manufacturing or supply agreement must settle: specifications, quality, liability, exclusivity and, above all, who owns the tooling, know-how and improvements.
- Guide · Commercial
Master Services Agreements and Statements of Work
How a master services agreement and statements of work split the legal terms from the project detail, and how EU and national rules shape the key clauses.
- Guide · Patents
Prior Art and How to Search for It
What counts as prior art under the European Patent Convention, what a patentability search covers, how it is done and what it cannot tell you.
- Guide · Commercial
Running a Request for Information or Proposal
How to run a request for information or proposal so that confidentiality, IP and your contract terms are protected before you choose a vendor.
- Guide · Commercial
SaaS Agreements
Subscriptions, service levels, data ownership, liability and exit in SaaS contracts, with the GDPR, the Data Act and national contract rules.
- Guide · Information Technology
The EU Data Act
What Regulation (EU) 2023/2854 requires of makers and users of connected products, data holders, cloud providers and anyone who contracts about data, and when each part applies.
- Guide · Intellectual property
Transferring and Licensing a Trademark
How assignments and licences of EU and Benelux trademarks work, why they should be recorded, and how customs recordals fit in.
- Guide · Intellectual property
What Is a Trademark Clearance Search?
A clearance search checks, before you file or launch, whether earlier rights stand in the way of a new mark. This article explains what it covers, what it cannot do and how to read the result.
- Guide · Intellectual property
What Is a Trademark Watch?
A trademark watch tells you when someone files a mark that resembles yours, while opposition is still possible. This article explains why it matters, how it works and what it cannot do.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
AI Act in HR and Recruitment: the High-Risk Rules
Recruitment and HR AI is usually high-risk under the AI Act (from 2 December 2027), and emotion recognition at work is banned. What employers must do.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
AI Act Meets GDPR: Where the Two Frameworks Overlap
How the AI Act and the GDPR apply side by side to the same AI system: roles, impact assessments, automated decisions, transparency, data quality and special categories.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
AI Act Provider vs Deployer: Duties and Article 25
Under the AI Act, the provider builds or brands an AI system and the deployer uses it. Each role's duties, and when Article 25 makes a deployer a provider.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
AI Act Risk Classification: the Four Risk Levels
The AI Act sorts AI into unacceptable (prohibited), high, limited (transparency) and minimal risk. How to tell which level your AI system falls in.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
AI and Intellectual Property: Training Data and Copyright
How EU copyright law and the AI Act treat training data, rights holders' opt-outs, training summaries, and the protection of AI-generated output and inventions.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
AI Clauses in Vendor Contracts: 9 Terms to Negotiate
The AI clauses to negotiate when you buy or supply AI: AI Act roles, training on your data, output ownership, IP indemnity, audit and logs, liability.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
Building an AI Governance Framework
What an internal AI governance framework consists of, which legal duties it must carry, and how a mid-sized organisation can build one in proportion to its use of AI.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
Conformity Assessments for High-Risk AI
What a provider of a high-risk AI system must demonstrate before market entry under the AI Act, which assessment route applies and what follows afterwards.
- Guide · Privacy & Data Protection
Cookies and Consent
When a cookie banner is required, what valid consent looks like and how the ePrivacy rules and the GDPR work together.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
EU AI Act Timeline: Every Date from 2024 to 2030
The AI Act applies in stages from 2 February 2025 to 31 December 2030. Every date, what applies and who it affects, with the 2026 high-risk postponement.
- Guide · Intellectual property
EUIPO Fast Track
Fast Track speeds up examination of EU trade mark applications that use pre-approved wording. This article explains what it is, what it does not change and when it makes sense.
- Guide · Privacy & Data Protection
GDPR Breach Notification: the 72-Hour Rule
Article 33 GDPR: notify the authority within 72 hours of becoming aware of a personal data breach. When to notify, how hours count, when to tell people.
- Guide · Privacy & Data Protection
GDPR Data Retention: How Long to Keep Personal Data
The GDPR sets no fixed retention period: Article 5(1)(e) allows no longer than necessary. How to set retention periods, handle backups and delete data.
- Guide · Privacy & Data Protection
How to Answer a DSAR Within the GDPR Deadline
Answer a data subject access request within one month, extendable by two (Articles 12 and 15 GDPR): what to send, what you may refuse, how to keep time.
- Guide · Privacy & Data Protection
International Data Transfers
How Chapter V GDPR works after Schrems II: adequacy decisions, the EU-US Data Privacy Framework, standard contractual clauses and the assessment that goes with them.
- Guide · Intellectual property
IP Cost Planning for Multi-Jurisdiction Filings
What a trademark portfolio costs depends on routes, classes and countries as much as on the number of marks. This article sets out the cost elements and how to plan them over the life of a mark.
- Guide · Corporate and M&A
M&A Due Diligence: What to Expect
What a due diligence review covers in a share or asset deal in the EU, how the process runs, and how the findings turn into price, warranties and conditions.
- Guide · Intellectual property
Managing Your IP Deadlines
Which time limits matter in trademark, design and patent matters, which of them can be extended, what happens when one is missed, and how a reliable deadline process is built.
- Guide · Intellectual property
Nice Classification: How the 45 Classes Work
The Nice Classification sorts goods and services into 45 trademark classes (software, for example, is in class 9). How to choose classes and word them.
- Guide · Intellectual property
Online Brand Protection: How Brand Monitoring Works
How infringements of a trademark are found online, which rules decide whether they are unlawful, and which routes exist to stop them.
- Guide · Privacy & Data Protection
Records of Processing Activities (RoPA)
What Article 30 GDPR requires you to record, who must keep a register, and how to keep it useful.
- Guide · Intellectual property
Renewal Management for IP Portfolios
How renewals of trademarks, designs and patents work, what the grace periods are, how to decide which rights to keep, and the invoice scams to avoid.
- Guide · Corporate and M&A
Sanctions Screening and Anti-Money Laundering
What EU sanctions and anti-money-laundering rules require from businesses, who must identify beneficial owners, and how screening works in practice.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
The AI Literacy Obligation
Article 4 of the AI Act has applied since February 2025 to every company using AI. What it requires, how the 2026 amendment changed it and what to document.
- Guide · Legal Aspects of Artificial Intelligence
The EU AI Act: a Practical Overview
What the AI Act regulates, who it applies to, how the risk-based approach works and what the penalties are, as of October 2026.
- Guide · Intellectual property
Trademark Registration: From Application to Registration
How a trademark application moves through the EUIPO, the Benelux office (BOIP) and the Madrid System, what happens after registration, and what keeps a registered mark in force.
- Guide · Intellectual property
Understanding Trademark Similarity
Whether two marks conflict depends on how similar they are and how close the goods are. This article explains the test and how its elements are weighed.
- Guide · Privacy & Data Protection
Website Technology Audits and the GDPR
What a website technology audit examines, why privacy notices and actual data flows drift apart, and which legal duties it checks.
- Guide · Intellectual property
When to Oppose a Trademark
Opposition lets the owner of an earlier right challenge a new trademark application before it is registered. This article explains the conditions, the deadlines and the factors that decide whether to proceed.
- Guide · New gTLDs
Brand TLDs in Financial Services
Why banks and insurers look at brand TLDs, what a brand TLD can and cannot do against phishing, and which EU rules shape the decision.
- Guide · New gTLDs
Brand TLDs in the 2026 Round: the Applicant Guidebook
What a brand TLD is, how the Applicant Guidebook treats it, and the contract obligations that come with running one.
- Guide · New gTLDs
ICANN's Next Round of New gTLDs (2026)
Where ICANN's 2026 round of new generic top-level domains stands in October 2026, how the process continues after the application window, and what it means for brand owners.
- Guide · New gTLDs
Strategic Use Cases for Brand TLDs
How companies use a brand TLD in practice, from authentication and anti-phishing to internal systems and partner networks, and the legal points that go with each use.
- Guide · Corporate and M&A
Transitional Services Agreements
What a transitional services agreement covers, the terms that decide whether the handover runs smoothly, and how to plan the exit from the start.
- Guide · New gTLDs
History of ICANN's New gTLD Program
How the top-level domain space grew from a handful of extensions to more than a thousand, and what the earlier rounds teach applicants and brand owners today.
- Guide · Tax
Copyright and Lawyers: Belgium's Court of Cassation
Belgium's Court of Cassation held that the rules of the legal profession do not rule out copyright in a lawyer's writing, and what this means for ownership, engagement letters and tax.
- Guide · Information Technology
The NIS2 Directive
Who falls under NIS2, what the directive requires, how the 24-hour, 72-hour and one-month incident reports work and how they relate to GDPR breach notification.
- Guide · Tax
Belgian Copyright Tax Regime After the 2023 Reform
In Belgium, copyright fees are taxed at 15% as movable income. What the 2023 reform changed and what to document so that the arrangement stands up.
- Guide · Patents
The Unified Patent Court
How the Unified Patent Court is organised, what it decides, how its proceedings differ from national courts, and what the opt-out means for your European patents.
- Guide · Patents
The Unitary Patent
What unitary effect is, which states it covers in October 2026, how it differs from validating a European patent country by country, and when each route makes sense.
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