McConnell Valdés LLC has the most accomplished Intellectual Property Practice Team in Puerto Rico. The objective of this Practice Team is the protection and enforcement of our clients' intellectual property rights. We assist and advise our clients in selecting and attaining the best form of protection for their trademarks, service marks, and copyrights under both United States and Puerto Rico intellectual property laws. This Team also coordinates for our clients the protection and enforcement of intellectual property in foreign jurisdictions by retaining and working closely with the most qualified attorneys in such jurisdictions.
The Intellectual Property Practice Team, comprised of attorneys from both the corporate and litigation practice groups of the firm, has been successful in obtaining injunctions against the importation of counterfeit, infringing and gray market products into Puerto Rico; injunctions in false advertisement cases; and injunctions in right-of-publicity cases. Attorneys in this Team represent clients in federal and local courts, before the Puerto Rico trademarks, commercial names, and moral rights registration agencies, and before the United States Patent and Trademark Office and the Copyright Office to defend or oppose registrations. They also assist clients with the drafting of sponsorship agreements, trademarks license agreement, and other types of agreements to protect their IP rights.
The attorneys in this Team are kept informed about the proposed IP laws and regulations and/or the proposed amendments thereto. In many instances, government officials in charge of such projects request our attorneys to provide comments and suggestions to the proposed laws and regulations and request assistance with the drafting of such laws and regulations. On one such instance McConnell Valdés was invited to help draft the new Trademarks Act of Puerto Rico and the Consumers' Defense Code. In addition, the Firm submitted proposed amendments to the new DACO Regulation on Misleading Practices and Advertisements, as we did in 2004 when such Regulation was last revised, and various proposals that we presented were included in the 2006 Regulation.
