Protecting trademarks, works and commercial innovation.
The firm advises on the protection, registration and commercial use of intellectual property, trademarks, copyrights and related rights, and acts in infringement disputes.
There is no single statute in the State of Qatar that gathers together every form of intellectual property. There is instead a group of instruments, each with its own subject matter, its own register and its own means of protection, so that the first step in any matter is to classify the asset in order to identify the law that governs it. Trademarks, commercial indications, trade names and geographical indications are governed by Law No. 9 of 2002. Copyright and neighbouring rights are governed by Law No. 7 of 2002. Inventions fall to be considered under the GCC Standard Patent Law as applied in the State. A common error is to treat an asset under a description the law does not accept, by seeking protection for a shape as though it were an invention, or by relying on a commercial registration as a title to a trademark.
These instruments rest on a fundamental distinction between a right that arises upon registration and a right that arises upon creation. A trademark, an invention and an industrial design are not fully protected until a formal step has been taken before the competent authority, producing a published title that can be asserted against third parties. A literary or artistic work, by contrast, is protected because it exists as an independent and original creation, without any need for deposit, and where a deposit system is organised it evidences the right rather than creating it. Coupled with that distinction is the principle of territoriality: registration in the State creates no right outside it, and registration abroad creates no right within it by itself, which makes a filing plan as much a commercial question as a legal one.
How we help
- Trademark advice and registration
- IP licensing and assignment
- Confidentiality arrangements
- Infringement disputes
- IP in commercial transactions
In Qatar
The department responsible for the protection of intellectual property within the Ministry of Commerce and Industry exercises the functions the legislation confers on it. It receives applications and examines them as to form and substance, decides upon acceptance, refusal or acceptance subject to conditions, publishes what it accepts, hears the oppositions filed with it, maintains the registers and records in them those dealings the law requires to be recorded, such as transfers of ownership, licences, pledges and changes in the proprietor's particulars, and issues the certificates and extracts relied upon in evidence before the courts and before customs. Dealings with that department are conducted in the manner and within the periods set out in the law, its executive regulations and the decisions issued in implementation of it.
The Civil Code issued by Law No. 22 of 2004 remains the general foundation upon which the contractual protection of intellectual property is built and by which the special statutes are completed. From it are drawn the rules on the formation, interpretation and good faith performance of contracts and on the determination of their subject matter and cause, and upon it rest licences, assignments, confidentiality undertakings and development agreements covering works protected by copyright. From it also come the rules on liability for a harmful act, under which compensation for material and moral harm is claimed, and the rules on unjust enrichment where their conditions are satisfied. Alongside it, the Commercial Law issued by Law No. 27 of 2006 applies to the commercial dealings in which these rights are exploited, so that the general texts complement the special legislation rather than displacing it.