How to remove fake products from the market

In this episode John talks to Julian Becker from Trade Mark Enforcement services. Julian explains how he has helped with 40,000 enforcements and how he uses the US law to take fake products off the internet.

Transcript

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:43:18
Unknown
The Deal Lawyer podcast with John Andrews powered by JMW Solicitors back in the mid nineties where I thought I was the world's greatest salesman. In effect. What we're what we got us to say is that the crime has been committed in your jurisdiction. The first thing they know about it is that their accounts countless frozen.

00:00:43:20 - 00:01:10:22
Unknown
Hello and welcome to the Deal Lawyer podcast. I'm John Andrews. And today we've got an interesting one for you. I'm joined by Jim Bakker, who's the director of Trademark Enforcement Services Ltd in brackets. Yes, I think I'll make it easier. Julian. Julian, welcome to the podcast. Thank you, John. I just have a little bit about your background, who you are and what exactly Jesus does.

00:01:10:24 - 00:01:37:24
Unknown
Sure. Well, I'll tell you who I'm not. I'm not a qualified lawyer. So that's a positive. Many people would say, well, possibly, possibly. So I started life in the telecoms world back in the mid-nineties where I thought that I was the world's greatest salesman. But what I realized was that I was dropped into an industry at the very much at the right time.

00:01:38:01 - 00:02:04:24
Unknown
And the right place just after the deregulation of B2B. But it was very much a Benjamin Button career in as much as I started earning what I look back on now as an extortion amount of money, as I as a very young man. But as life went on and as the years progressed, it actually became less and less as far as competition in that market increased.

00:02:05:01 - 00:02:36:18
Unknown
I kind of moved from the corporate world into a calling card market and from there sort of moved into premium right services and supplying content, which is kind of where I first came across sort of copyright in as much as I was providing content. And as the years progressed, technology progressed and mobile phones, as we know now, are more of a conduit for data services than they are actual phone calls.

00:02:36:20 - 00:03:08:05
Unknown
I think people have almost lost the ability to actually speak on the phone. It's almost used predominantly for data. So I kind of got involved more in content and I was of quite intrigued by almost like the complexities and the difficulties of protecting copyright through European legal system. In as much as you very much had to give warning.

00:03:08:07 - 00:03:38:08
Unknown
I'm very much playing the game in as much as you would be sending letters, cease and desist. A lot of it was that it had very little teeth, that there was there wasn't a lot you could do in the first kind of big challenge was often identifying the people that were infringing the copyright because they were often hiding behind email addresses, websites.

00:03:38:10 - 00:04:10:12
Unknown
So actually finding them, actually finding a physical address was was difficult. So although I kind of got quite a bit of experience in in copyright protection through through Europe and predominantly through the UK court system, I actually found it very, very challenging due to the fact that it was almost like so difficult, number one, to identify. And then when you could identify actually going through the process and in effect your warning people not to do it.

00:04:10:14 - 00:04:47:05
Unknown
And you know, if they if they did carry on doing it and then you'd get serial infringers that the people that were infringing as a one off would often adhere to a cease and desist. But the serial infringers, the real commercial professional infringers that they often were I wouldn't say above the law, but they kind of really that in order to go through the whole process was almost I wouldn't say impossible, but from a commercial perspective, it became not very viable.

00:04:47:07 - 00:05:15:10
Unknown
Okay. So so would it be fair to say that you sort of identified a gap in the market in terms of protecting intellectual property rights and in particular copyright issues? Well, it was more of a case of I was discovering how difficult it was to go to the UK system to follow. I mean, obviously from a legal process, it's imperative to follow exactly the procedures that you have to do.

00:05:15:12 - 00:05:42:07
Unknown
But coming from a non legal background and coming from a commercial background, I was realizing that if you follow the procedures, yes, you would, you know, you would win the case. It was undoubtedly you would win the case, but to the case you would be out of pocket and then the infringers would pop companies up. Their companies would go into liquidation and they'd start up again.

00:05:42:09 - 00:06:24:02
Unknown
And it was very much almost like Whac-A-Mole. So. So what is it you do that's different? How do you protect brands? Well, I kind of looked at the US system. The US legal system was far more favorable and almost like draconian to the content owners and I looked a very much trademarked and there was something in the US system called the Lanham Act, and the Lanham Act is perfect for protecting the trademark for offshore infringers and offshore meaning us.

00:06:24:02 - 00:06:59:11
Unknown
So you can't go after domestic infringers with the Lanham Acts. Yeah. However, you could go after foreign infringers with a lot of marks now because we were looking to target the major infringers, the major distribution manufacturers of counterfeit goods. We weren't specifically targeting the Chinese, but the reality was that when we're looking for the evidence, probably over 95% of the evidence was leading back to China.

00:06:59:13 - 00:07:28:07
Unknown
We weren't interested in the small seller in a physical marketplace case, you know, in a literally, you know, on the streets or outside a football stadium or a concert venue. What we were interested in was the suppliers, the main suppliers of the counterfeit goods. And the reality was, was that they were based outside of the US and were often based outside of the UK as well.

00:07:28:11 - 00:07:59:13
Unknown
A lot of the the main domestic market you might infringes on based in these locations. The reality is they're based in the Far East, the Indian subcontinent, and those are the people and companies that we were targeting. So the simple process is that we make a test purchase into the US. And could you could you explain to me how you identify the counterfeit goods in the first place and how you made that first purchase?

00:07:59:16 - 00:08:24:12
Unknown
Sure. Okay. So there's a number of products indicated. So the first thing we need to do is learn the Brians is learn what makes a genuine product. Now, it can be quite subtle. I've worked on brands before. Where you looking at the genuine product and then you looking at the counterfeit products and there can be very, very little difference to the naked eye.

00:08:24:12 - 00:08:49:09
Unknown
It could be a slightly different color scheme. Yeah, it's almost like when you see these cartoons in X spot. The difference? Yeah, it's like five really minor differences and they might just be one. And you really have to, if you want to take this job properly as an investigator, you really have to be able to identify first of all, what is a genuine product.

00:08:49:11 - 00:09:32:00
Unknown
And a lot of brands will have product indicators that will almost have a Bible of what is a real product, which is great. It just accelerates that process. A lot of brands don't have that. So we in effect, build that that for them by studying the actual genuine product. So it can be quite subtle. But on the other side of things and quite often it's not so subtle, you can look at certain trading platforms and on certain trading platforms, the reality is over 90% of the branded products on those platforms are not genuine licensed product.

00:09:32:02 - 00:09:58:16
Unknown
Right. It kind of makes it relatively easy that if the products are appearing on those particular platforms, the chances are it's not a genuine product. Okay. There are other there are other products indicates that we're looking at. The most important one is price point. The reality is the reason why the counterfeit market is so popular is because it charges less.

00:09:58:17 - 00:10:21:19
Unknown
The products are being offered for less than the genuine products. And that, again, is no bias product to indicate to the if you know, the retail and wholesale price of the genuine products and you see that the products being sold significantly less than the threshold that the brands are setting. Again, there's a very, very good chance that that isn't genuine product.

00:10:21:21 - 00:10:48:12
Unknown
The other thing to look at, again, a little bit more subtle but obvious when you think about it, is client reviews, because if you look at customer reviews, quite often they've received it's genuine product and they're reviewing it and they'll give you the answer. If you look at the client reviews as a client, reviews are very negative. Then again, that's a good indication.

00:10:48:18 - 00:11:16:06
Unknown
And when you actually read those client reviews, if it is fake products, quite often it was cited on there. Okay. So having identified the fake goods, you then go online and and do a test purchase. Yep. The threshold for the landmark is that they are prepared to supply in the jurisdiction. So we don't always have to do a physical test purchase.

00:11:16:06 - 00:11:40:14
Unknown
We can do a virtual test, which is so long as they've agreed to supply us in that jurisdiction. That's enough of a threshold for the US courts. Okay, so having got over that threshold, you receive or virtually receive your counterfeit goods. Yeah. And then perhaps explain to our listeners what, what, what the course of action that is after that.

00:11:40:20 - 00:12:05:22
Unknown
Okay. So the first reason to do that test purchase is, again, to get jurisdiction in effect, what where what we're going to the US courts and say is that the crime has been committed in your jurisdiction because it's been supplied into that jurisdiction. So that's the first thing and that's really important to get the jurisdiction relevant. And this is where I learned from.

00:12:05:24 - 00:12:36:05
Unknown
So the European system is that ultimately we want this to be commercially viable. So so identify is the payment processes, in effect, their bank account. Okay. So what we've what we've seen over the years, even though a lot of these infringers and most of them are very, very, very difficult to identify, like again, they're hiding behind listings. They're hiding behind websites website.

00:12:36:07 - 00:13:08:08
Unknown
They're hiding behind email addresses. You don't physically know where they are. But what you can do is go through those listings and get the bank account behind it. And most of the infringers use payment processes that are under the jurisdiction of the US courts. The reason being is that they're undertaking international trade. And most companies and individuals around the world have more faith in payment processes that are under the jurisdiction.

00:13:08:08 - 00:13:37:03
Unknown
The US courts payment processes such as Amazon Pay, such as PayPal, and also offers some form of protection to the consumers. Because if the goods don't arrive or if the goods come not as described, there are mechanisms within those payment processes for them to get a refund on those on on those funds. So it's very much identified that the choke point is the payment processes.

00:13:37:05 - 00:14:04:10
Unknown
Yeah. In effect, what we do instead of sending as in what I've experienced in the European system, where you send a letter before action, you're in effect giving them warning of what happens if they don't infringe. The first thing they know about it is that their accounts are frozen. Okay? And that as a consequence of you taking legal action in the states to secure or freezing order.

00:14:04:15 - 00:14:31:23
Unknown
Exactly. So, okay, we are taking what to our own temporary restraining orders against the payment processors or in conjunction with the payment process of the payment process, in effect, to working with us on One of the great benefits of the Lanham Act is that you are able to serve electron any claim through the payment processes, which is really key to this process, right?

00:14:31:23 - 00:15:06:09
Unknown
Absolutely. Because otherwise, given some of the industries that you're going after, you'd never be able to surf and physically with you. You don't even know where they are. Yeah. Yeah. So if you did know where they were, then you'd have to get localized agents in their jurisdictions to find them and serve. So being able to serve them electronically through the payment processes is really crucial to the commercial element of what we're doing because it's so it's so economically viable to do that.

00:15:06:11 - 00:15:30:18
Unknown
Yeah, I've got that. So we've got a freeze in order. Yeah, freeze. The funds that are in the payment processes account, which ordinarily they would then pass on to the accounts officer. Would that be correct? That would be correct. But I need to identify and clarify what we term freezing. Yeah. So we're not freezing the account as in they can't use the account.

00:15:30:20 - 00:16:19:24
Unknown
All they're able to do or not able to do is withdraw funds. Right. So they're not able to withdraw the funds. And that's really key, especially in the US legal system, which is very well known. And has a reputation for counterclaims. So yeah, what we're not doing, we're not publicly humiliating them by putting on their sites and on their accounts if they're on eBay, whatever they've been accused, or that they're guilty of trademark infringement, all we're doing is stopping them, prohibiting them from withdrawing funds until we've been able to identify further any any evidence to the contrary.

00:16:20:01 - 00:17:00:02
Unknown
Okay. So presumably the advantage of that is if they continue to trade, there's money still going into the account. Exactly. And here's where quite often it really works in that they take their accounts down themselves, because as you quite rightly pointed out, is that if they know they're guilty, they don't want more funds going into that account. So it's quite often you you talk about takedown services and most takedown services identify the listings and just take just take down the listings.

00:17:00:04 - 00:17:27:00
Unknown
Now, there's software that can do this, and it is pretty advanced software that can trawl through the Internet, take down particular listings that are identified as infringing. But on the other side of it, and this is what you don't hear so much, is that the infringers often have their own version of that software that works the other way.

00:17:27:02 - 00:18:00:20
Unknown
Right. So what happens are you have your software taken down the listings. They have even better software taken out. So quite often you get the takedown services on the listings that you get a report saying, you know, we've had 10,322 listings taken down this month and think, right, you know, that's brilliant. But the other side of it is how many listings of them just popped up, which is why you get this terminology of it's like whack a mole and it's like even it's electronically like whack a mole.

00:18:00:23 - 00:18:28:00
Unknown
They're not even doing it manually much the most. The big infringers have their own software that can basically just just put the listings back up. But what we're doing, we're going beyond the listings to identify the bank accounts behind it, which is again, really crucial to the process because I guess one of the reasons that that's crucial is in this day and age, it's not easy to get the bank account set up in the first place.

00:18:28:00 - 00:18:55:09
Unknown
So once you've got it, that's a pretty valuable asset. Yeah, I mean, it's quite an understatement to say it's difficult. You need a whole set of really kind of sterile new details. Yeah, and it's not easy. You need new IP address, so you've got to get, you know, Yes, you can get a VPN, but you need a new name, new passport.

00:18:55:11 - 00:19:18:02
Unknown
They in effect, every time they have a bank account taken down, you need someone new to go and get get you a bank account. Of course, you don't want someone taking a bank account out with your money. Yeah, that's that's not something that they want to do. And again, going back to the listings, what you can often find is that the listings are just a facade you can have.

00:19:18:02 - 00:19:41:07
Unknown
And we've had experience with this where you've had hundreds of listings all pointing back to the same bank account. So it's very effective. If you can take out that one bank account, you're permanently losing those listings. They're not popping up again because as you quite rightly pointed out, it's not impossible to get a new bank account, but it is very, very difficult.

00:19:41:11 - 00:20:04:08
Unknown
And in fact, you've got to get someone new in to get you that new bank account. Okay. So security and we've frozen that. Well, when I say first the bank, how we stock funds going out of it stands still going in. What then happens in terms of resolving dispute typically what's the outcome? Okay. So one of two things happen.

00:20:04:10 - 00:20:36:01
Unknown
One is, as I said before, quite difficult to identify who they are when would serve them electronically through their payment processor. We've also given them our details so we don't need to find them. They come and find us. They don't have to look too hard because we've told them where they can find us. Yeah, so what they what they would typically do, especially if there's substantial funds in their accounts, they'll reach out to settle.

00:20:36:03 - 00:21:20:13
Unknown
Right now, more often than not, they're looking at they often, as a defense, have mitigating circumstances almost like the same party by all. I didn't know. But again, I'm no lawyer, but I don't know any legal systems around the world that ignorance is a valid defense. Yeah, no, they don't really have too much depends. And if a genuine license holder was to get caught up in this action, very, very unlikely because the processes we have, first of all, software similar to the takedown services that were like will identify what we believe are fakes.

00:21:20:15 - 00:21:52:24
Unknown
Then we have physical eyes on those listings investigators who will then cut down that number. Then we have a team leader above them that will verify it. Then we have a client portal where the clients will verify that in their opinion it's fake. Yeah. And then the final eyes on it is the lawyer in the US who's who's going to court to, to, to basically say it's fake.

00:21:53:01 - 00:22:28:16
Unknown
So you have four different stages before it gets to the court system itself. All of those stages were to fall down and fail. Then the failsafe is going back to the definition of freezing the accounts. The fact all you're doing is denying them the ability to withdraw funds if at that point they provide evidence that we're all happy with, that they are a genuine license holder, we can then inform the payment processor and within 24 business hours, is this working hours?

00:22:28:18 - 00:22:52:06
Unknown
That account can be unfrozen. Yeah. And I guess the advantage of the freezing old continuing to allow funds to go in is that if that does happen, it limits the scope for the genuine license holders to bring a claim against your client because they won't have lost to be tried in the in the meantime. Exactly. And that's especially important in the US system.

00:22:52:08 - 00:23:19:15
Unknown
Yeah. And in all the years that I've been working in this particular area of law since 2016, I've been involved in I think over 40,000 cases against individual infringers. Now, again, one thing I'll go back to is the commercial element that they serve, the Lanham Act is federal law. Yeah, but different states view it differently.

00:23:19:15 - 00:23:42:20
Unknown
There's different interpretations. The states that we operate in and this is really important to the commercial aspect of it will allow us to be more relaxed on joinder issues, which means we can join defendants to the action which made up of the bigger brands. We can go 102 other, usually out to about 500 defendants in one case. Right.

00:23:43:00 - 00:24:12:15
Unknown
So when I say, you know, I've been involved in over 40,000 actually got over 40,000 infringers, it's not that many case, not 40,000 case, because we group them together. But the years that I've been involved, I can only think of one or two instances where a genuine license holder was caught up in the action away from. They were a genuine license holder, but I didn't have a license for that product in that jurisdiction.

00:24:12:17 - 00:24:40:17
Unknown
Right. So at that point we referred back to the brands, as we usually do, and that brand asked us to release them and that they would then have their own negotiations with that license holder. So that particular was in effect, it was still an infringement. Yeah, we were I was we were able to do that. Okay. So so you're in a negotiation process, hopefully with the with the infringer.

00:24:40:19 - 00:25:12:12
Unknown
Yeah. What's the common outcome of those negotiations, Presumably some payment out of the account to your client. Yeah. The common, the different scenarios. But to summarize exactly if you did is that two things happen. Number one, there will be a financial settlement and number two, there will be an undertaking not to infringe. Okay. Now, number two is really interesting because you are dealing with criminals.

00:25:12:14 - 00:25:48:16
Unknown
Yeah. And you think, well, it's just a piece of paper. But one thing I can tell you, it is just a piece of paper. And I'm not naive to think that they wake up one day after meeting our company and think, right. We've seen the error of our ways. We're never going to infringe again. But what they realize is that most of them work verticals that that particular brand that they've been caught for is protected in a very efficient way.

00:25:48:18 - 00:26:18:13
Unknown
So when the verticals let let's say, for instance, I always like the example of football teams. So let's say that they are selling Tottenham shirts. Yeah, so they get caught infringing Tottenham, they know they've got standing gilded T-shirts. What about the actual kits? They can be a guild and t shirt with, with the Tottenham logo on it. Yeah.

00:26:18:15 - 00:26:49:08
Unknown
And they get caught with that. They've still got thousands of Gildan t shirts in their stock rooms. Yeah, but they realize that Tottenham is now is now well protected. They would just move on to Arsenal. Yeah. Because they know they know now that it's not and they basically they are criminals but they're also business people. They realize that it's not efficient, economically viable for them to carry on infringing Tottenham.

00:26:49:08 - 00:27:18:12
Unknown
So they'll just move to a different, different brand. But in all the years that I've been undertaking this, I have never come across a repeat offender of the same brand. Quite often we track them and then infringe a different brand and we'll catch them again for different brands. But in all those years I've never had an infringer repeat infringe the same brand.

00:27:18:14 - 00:27:41:03
Unknown
Well, well, that that's an incredible statistic. Actually, I was I was wondering as he was talking just then, what stops and just from paying out some cash and then and then the very next day just just infringing again. But the fact that you guys are so diligent and the fact that they've been caught and they've had to make a payment clearly is a massive deterrent.

00:27:41:05 - 00:28:16:14
Unknown
As you mentioned at the outset of this podcast, you you're you're not a lawyer, but but you do work with us. Sarah Jane W what's the relationship? How does that work? Well, one of your senior lawyers, John Burges, who's head of Bryan's, is also co-director of Tess, which really helps out not only does it give me the credibility not being a lawyer, but working so closely with such a large law firm really kind of enforces what we do.

00:28:16:16 - 00:28:55:17
Unknown
Yeah. In his matches. Yes, I understand. It's very it's a it's a niche. It's a niche piece of legislation in the US. But one thing working with GW is you guys understand the full scope of trademark enforcement and where this might fit into the bigger picture, because I just do one very, very precise element, whereas J.M.W. not only for trademark, but obviously you have various different departments and cover everything.

00:28:55:17 - 00:29:38:00
Unknown
So a lot of the brands that I work with don't just need this particular element of legislation, this particular element of protection. They will need services right across the legal board. So allows me to do is be able to refer them straight into they'll be obviously working with John. Very. Yeah. We're going in together. And one thing I learned very early on in my working life is that sales people were offering one single product that made you a salesperson, which didn't get too much credibility because ultimately you were trying to push people into one element.

00:29:38:01 - 00:30:11:18
Unknown
You only had one thing to offer, but the difference with a salesperson or a consultant was a consultant had a multitude of different services or products that they could offer. Yeah, they were really out there with deep dive into the client's needs and they'd offer what was appropriate to the client. And one thing I realized with Tess is that, yes, what we do is very, very effective, but in effect we just the sales sales all because we've only got one one thing to offer.

00:30:11:24 - 00:30:33:23
Unknown
But working so close, which W allows us to kind of look with John and understand fully what that client needs and then be okay, appropriately. Yeah. And I guess part of that process is, is when you're looking at the brands that the clients seek to protect. John Classic review of what brands that are initial, they're effectively protected as well.

00:30:34:03 - 00:30:56:12
Unknown
Exactly exactly. Because the other side of it is that I can only enforce when the trademarks and copyrights are very much in place. Right. That's a that's not Yeah, that's a key point to make at the end. Yeah. Yes. So and that's not that I do as I said Tess just is involved in the enforcement side of it.

00:30:56:14 - 00:31:20:20
Unknown
You need to set the infrastructure up really early to make sure that Tess can undertake what we need to undertake. And if that's not properly, we don't have the in-house skills and abilities to be able to do that. And I was always previously referring this work to companies and firms I didn't really know, I didn't really work closely with was now it feels, although Tess is very much its own limited company.

00:31:20:22 - 00:31:44:06
Unknown
So yeah, let's say we do work very closely with Jim Dalby, so it almost feels like an in-house referral. Okay, brilliant. So I guess one bird in question, Jerusalem happiness is that how do you guys get paid, presumably in the States? I seem to think that most of the time there's a kind of no cost recovery regime, but I don't know.

00:31:44:11 - 00:32:14:23
Unknown
It's the same in this particular scenario. Yeah, I think it's important that we sort of finish off the the process because yeah, on the on the settlement, I'll give you two examples of settlements that I've undertaken in the last few years. One of them we froze, I think it was about $15 million in an account. And once we once we done that, that actually settled within, I think it was 5 hours.

00:32:15:00 - 00:32:42:02
Unknown
Wow, that happened. Which again, is just testament to the effectiveness of being able to freeze funds and going through a much more elongated legal process. And the end of that negotiation was the we ended up with a $100,000 settlement. And if you think about it, that's a very, very small percentage of the frozen funds. Yeah, which sounds like a negative.

00:32:42:04 - 00:33:11:20
Unknown
However, when we got counsel opinion on the actual infringement, what came back was they believe that if it had gone through the court process, which it was very unlikely to ever do, they would have probably ended up with about 70 to $80000 compensation award. Yeah. So and all the time and expense of going to the court system, we ended up with more than that.

00:33:11:20 - 00:33:38:12
Unknown
So which is, which is great. Yeah. The infringers perspective, their whole business was paralyzed because they couldn't withdraw funds and they were very enthusiastic to settle and they didn't particularly mind that they were paying a little bit more than going through the whole court system because time was of the elements that worked out. I wouldn't say it was a win win because it was you know, it's a it's a loss for the infringer.

00:33:38:14 - 00:34:16:01
Unknown
But it's a loss they were very much prepared to take to teach them not to infringe. That brings that brand. Yeah. Another example was we froze $0.33 in an account within a day. We'd settled for $10,000. I presume that's on the basis that they want their their account back and operational as quickly as possible. Exactly. Because when we looked into that accounts, then I think about 2 minutes before it was frozen, we were just unlucky.

00:34:16:03 - 00:34:48:12
Unknown
Yeah. Broken up about 2 minutes before it was frozen. There was, I think about $250,000 in the account, think to survive in. So they had been it just been empty and it was just I mean, they wouldn't have known the phrase no one was coming, but they were very enthusiastic to get back out back. I remember my days as a litigator, which is a long time ago, that it was always like if you got a freezing order as to what was in the account at the point in time when you got it served.

00:34:48:12 - 00:35:24:21
Unknown
So yeah, I get that. Yeah. And again, if you're if you're going against hundreds of infringers in one action, the majority of them will have negligible amounts in those accounts. But there will be enough in there hopefully across the board to, to warrant, to warrant the case. So to answer, answer your question, we pay the clients revenue based rights so it doesn't matter what our costs are.

00:35:24:23 - 00:35:57:20
Unknown
And occasionally we have lost money on these cases. The example is that we always want to file on the sale because the way that the process works is that we'll get the order a couple of days after the case, you know, issued by by the judge. We will then serve it on the payment processors who usually take a week to ten days to then action that called up.

00:35:57:22 - 00:36:34:02
Unknown
Yeah. If it's not on the sale then the infringers they're not just waiting but they kind of know. When I first started in this area, hardly anyone was doing it. Now it's become a lot more accepted. The infringers start to learn techniques to combat it. They're not just there waiting to hand over their money. The way that they're combating it is their own on court websites looking for these cases where they are appearing in the public sphere, usually within 24 hours of the case happening.

00:36:34:04 - 00:37:04:12
Unknown
So if it's not on the sale, they'll know about that. So that particular brand going through the courts before, I would say to effect the freezing order. So okay, but they take it right. Okay. For the next few weeks, we need to make sure we withdraw all our phones. Yeah, as a default, most judges won't want the their orders on the sale.

00:37:04:14 - 00:37:43:14
Unknown
Okay? It's not it's not the dumb thing, but most of them understand that if they don't, in effect, frustrates the court system, the legal system, because, you know, they just withdraw funds. So some judges, depending on which ones you draw on the circuit, won't allow them to go on the sale. Will still take the case. Yeah, but genuinely, generally, at that point, as a company, we lose money because there's not enough in there to warrant and justify the expense.

00:37:43:14 - 00:38:15:09
Unknown
We've gone through both through the investigations, the test purchases and of course, you know, lawyers expensive, especially in the US. Yeah, exactly. But regardless of the fact whether the test wins or loses, we pay on gross revenue. So if we were to pull in just $1,000 for a court case, which I can assure everyone, we would be losing substantial amount of money, we would still pay our revenue share to okay to the client.

00:38:15:14 - 00:38:45:15
Unknown
So it's always going to be cash positive for the client regardless. So it very much protects them against a guy losing money through litigation. Okay. Pretty well, actually. And that's been a real fascinating insight into one really valuable route of protecting IP rights. If one of our listeners want to get touch with you in terms of sort of email, what's the best email address to get get it, get see this?

00:38:45:15 - 00:39:15:03
Unknown
Julian Giulia I am at Tess hyphen IP dot com. Okay. Got to say thank you very much for joining me on the podcast today. Pleasure. Real pleasure. Thanks very much for listening to the Deal Lawyer podcast on John Andrews. If you want to contact me to discuss any of the issues raised in this podcast or indeed any previous ones, do email me on John Dot Andrews and WD Echo Dot UK.

00:39:15:05 - 00:39:38:24
Unknown
Well, my mobile number is 0768266036 speech. You say.