Intellectual Property Protection and Enforcement Manual - Ipr-policy.eu
Intellectual Property Protection and Enforcement Manual - Ipr-policy.eu
Intellectual Property Protection and Enforcement Manual - Ipr-policy.eu
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Br<strong>and</strong> <strong>Protection</strong> <strong>Manual</strong><br />
National Basketball Association<br />
Since it made its Olympic debut at the Berlin Summer Games in 1936, basketball has<br />
long been considered an international sport. But it wasn’t until America’s Dream Team<br />
stepped on the world stage at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics that the National Basketball<br />
Association (NBA) became a truly global br<strong>and</strong>. Whereas the league’s ambassadors at that<br />
time were American-born superstars like Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, <strong>and</strong> Magic Johnson,<br />
today’s NBA rosters are filled with international stars like France’s Tony Parker, Argentina’s<br />
Manu Ginobili, <strong>and</strong> China’s Yao Ming. With this growing international presence, dem<strong>and</strong><br />
has surged for NBA products like jerseys <strong>and</strong> posters.<br />
When it comes to guarding its br<strong>and</strong>,<br />
the NBA works tirelessly to protect its<br />
famous player silhouette logo, as well<br />
as a host of other br<strong>and</strong>s including its<br />
affiliated women’s league, the WNBA;<br />
the NBA D-League; USA Basketball;<br />
<strong>and</strong> the 60 teams currently playing in<br />
these leagues. All together, the NBA’s<br />
portfolio includes more than 35,000<br />
trademarks in more than 200 countries,<br />
including team names, primary<br />
<strong>and</strong> secondary logos, tag lines, <strong>and</strong><br />
even mascots.<br />
The NBA works with local,<br />
state, federal, <strong>and</strong> international<br />
law enforcement agencies<br />
to share information, improve<br />
public-private sector<br />
coordination, <strong>and</strong>, ultimately,<br />
thwart counterfeiters.<br />
With all these elements to monitor, the NBA has tasked Ayala D<strong>eu</strong>tsch with the<br />
responsibility of protecting the league’s br<strong>and</strong> from counterfeiting <strong>and</strong> piracy on a global<br />
level. Working out of the NBA’s New York City headquarters as senior vice president <strong>and</strong><br />
chief intellectual property counsel, D<strong>eu</strong>tsch sums up the top three priorities for her team as<br />
fighting “the counterfeiting of hard goods, content piracy, <strong>and</strong> br<strong>and</strong> theft.”<br />
To protect against hard goods counterfeiting, the NBA focuses on popular NBA<br />
merch<strong>and</strong>ise such as T-shirts, jerseys, basketballs, <strong>and</strong> caps. To this end, the NBA works<br />
with local, state, federal, <strong>and</strong> international law enforcement agencies to share information,<br />
improve public-private sector coordination, <strong>and</strong>, ultimately, thwart counterfeiters.<br />
As counterfeiters become more sophisticated, D<strong>eu</strong>tsch <strong>and</strong> her team always try to stay one<br />
step ahead through creative <strong>and</strong> nontraditional approaches. For instance, D<strong>eu</strong>tsch points<br />
out that the NBA participates in a task force in New York City that, “with the help of<br />
the NYPD, has succeeded in having fines <strong>and</strong> other penalties imposed on l<strong>and</strong>lords who<br />
repeatedly rent their buildings to counterfeiters.” This was accomplished by br<strong>and</strong> owners<br />
<strong>and</strong> law enforcement working closely with city officials, who found building code<br />
violations at the buildings that harbored criminal IP networks.<br />
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