Düsseldorf, 29.10.2015 – Staying ahead in terms of knowledge is particularly important and plays a vital role for the success of a company. This can include confidential business knowledge, technical know-how or other information with which companies wish to secure a competitive advantage. Wherever knowledge is “stolen”, the damage is often high and difficult to repair: The responsible German Federal authorities estimate the damages suffered by the German industry every year to amount to between 30 and 60 billion euros But this is not merely an abstract, general economic issue: The affected companies also have to deal with the financial consequences of know-how theft and counterfeiting of merchandize. “Many do not know how they should go about protecting themselves and which possibilities they have to give themselves the best possible protection", says Erik Schäfer, attorney-at-law and partner at Cohausz & Florack. “In addition to technical protection possibilities to ensure secrecy, agreements should be made to obligate the involved parties to keep confidential information secret”. Companies that take such precautionary measures then have the necessary legal possibilities to act in case their knowledge does actually become available to unauthorised third parties.
In addition, the technical protection of confidential IT-based information of course also plays an important role: “Even allegedly safe data can sometimes become available to outsiders. Those who establish sensible structures for in-formation security in their companies at an early stage can prevent and protect their information from loss and misuse”, explains Wolfgang Straßer, Managing Director of the IT security service provider @-yet.
In order to make companies aware of the protection of know-how and to inform them about the necessary measures, Cohausz & Florack is offering a seminar in cooperation with @-yet:
“Losing know-how – a new challenge.
Legal, organisational and technical aspects”
on 1st December 2015
from 8:00 am to 12:00 pm
in the offices of COHAUSZ & FLORACK,
Bleichstraße 14, 40211 Düsseldorf.
The event is aimed at managers, department managers and employees from R&D and patent departments, as well as product managers, salespersons, pur-chasers and other staff who come into contact with third parties.
