Our Team

Eric Ziehlke

Partner
Com­mer­cial, IP & Technology

I have over 20 years’ expe­ri­ence as an IP lawyer and joined Swaab in 2015. A spe­cial­ist in all facets of trade mark law and prac­tice, with an empha­sis on mar­ket­ing con­sid­er­a­tions, I have a vast knowl­edge of intel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty mat­ters gen­er­al­ly, includ­ing copy­right, which can be applied in the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion, devel­op­ment and pro­tec­tion of IP rights. I am also expe­ri­enced in trade mark pros­e­cu­tions, non-use removals and oppo­si­tions, pass­ing off and con­sumer law, IP due dili­gence, copy­right advice and have cre­at­ed and imple­ment­ed mar­ket­ing strate­gies for clients. 

Expe­ri­ence

  • Han­dling of pas­sen­ger and freight legal issues for inter­na­tion­al airlines
  • Super­vi­sion of the inter­na­tion­al trade mark port­fo­lio of an Aus­tralian enter­tain­ment com­pa­ny and nego­ti­at­ing inter­na­tion­al set­tle­ment agreements
  • Defend­ing intel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty rights includ­ing per­son­al image issues for a num­ber of promi­nent crick­eters, surfers and footballers
  • Advis­ing on par­al­lel impor­ta­tion issues for lead­ing Aus­tralian appli­ance suppliers
  • Review and licens­ing of major R&D technology
  • Prepar­ing con­fi­den­tial­i­ty and licens­ing agree­ments for a range of start-up companies
  • Super­vis­ing lit­i­ga­tion to pro­tect the well-known ban­ner brand of an Aus­tralian retailer
  • Prepar­ing doc­u­men­ta­tion for fran­chis­ing com­pa­nies in ser­vice industries
  • Prepa­ra­tion of spe­cif­ic pro­vi­sions of employ­ment agree­ments to safe­guard the intel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty of clients

Exper­tise

  • Intel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty law
  • Trade mark law
  • Con­sumer law

Roles, mem­ber­ships and education

  • Mas­ter of Laws (Intel­lec­tu­al Prop­er­ty) — Uni­ver­si­ty of Tech­nol­o­gy Syd­ney, 2004
  • Mas­ter of Com­merce (Mar­ket­ing) — Uni­ver­si­ty of NSW, 1978

Publications

Brands as a Legal Asset

Intro­duc­tion Brands are an intel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty asset. Unfor­tu­nate­ly they rarely appear on a company’s bal­ance sheet. As a con­se­quence, brands may often…
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Make your mark in China

Pro­tect­ing your trade mark in China Aus­tralian busi­ness­es are increas­ing­ly recog­nis­ing the grow­ing impor­tance of Chi­na both as a mar­ket for their…
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