Legal Forms etc - Confidentiality Agreements
Discussion
Help if I could spell...
Does anyone know where I can download a confidentiality agreement to modify? I have a new product that a company will be selling for us that they could easily make themselves, so I need to cover my backside a bit. Volume wont be exceptionally high therefore doesn’t justify paying legal tossers to line their own pockets when I can do it myself.
Cheers.
Does anyone know where I can download a confidentiality agreement to modify? I have a new product that a company will be selling for us that they could easily make themselves, so I need to cover my backside a bit. Volume wont be exceptionally high therefore doesn’t justify paying legal tossers to line their own pockets when I can do it myself.
Cheers.
If you google "confidentiality agreement" you will find plenty of examples although most of them involve payment of a fee.
Personally I don't put much store by a confidentiality agreement because it only works if you can prove the trail of disclosure.
But what do I know? I'm just a legal tosser...
Personally I don't put much store by a confidentiality agreement because it only works if you can prove the trail of disclosure.
But what do I know? I'm just a legal tosser...
I really have no idea how you can protect your idea.
Even if you patent it, someone can usually find a method of making the same thing but slightly different.
If it really is as unique and valuable as you feel, then maybe involve a solicitor to draw the document up because it will only be when you go to court, should they steal the idea, that you will find out how good the document is.
Even if you patent it, someone can usually find a method of making the same thing but slightly different.
If it really is as unique and valuable as you feel, then maybe involve a solicitor to draw the document up because it will only be when you go to court, should they steal the idea, that you will find out how good the document is.
Straying outside my precise sphere of expertise but:
- the only protection offered for "ideas" is a patent but that can be very wide ranging. A patent is more than just "this is my idea and you can't use it" as the submissions that go with a patent application are worded in broad terms. As an example, if you had invented the car and wanted to protect it you would submit something describing a multi-wheeled vehicle with its own self contained power source of any description featuring enclosed or open seating for passengers and/or luggage space and in any configuration of wheels, seating etc Detailed submissions run on for pages and if the patent is granted then anything which is covered by the patent is a breach of your property rights and can be stopped by appropriate court action. So if you invented a petrol driven car your desription would be aimed at anything powered by every fuel imaginable including petrol, diesel, gas, nuclear power, rubber bands, pedals or any other means of propulsion
- some "ideas" are protected by copyright but this is limited to images and words. A story cannot be copyrighted but the way in which it is told or the pictures which accompany it can be. Even Shakespeare borrowed a few story lines from elsewhere.
- there are also trade marks but these are probably not relevant here. They can also be difficult to enforce. Peter Carter-Ruck once wrote to Private Eye on behalf of a client complaining that the magazine used "Biro" without acknowledging the trade mark attached to the name. PE's response was "what a sad way to make a living"
The best means I have seen for protecting an idea is to get whatever patent and/or copyright protection you can and then licence the benefit of the product to a manufacturer or distributer. As well as setting out what the company can do with the product it also covers things they can't do eg copy, reverse engineer, compete or undermine.
There is no perfect answer but the starting point is to protect what you have and work from there.
Good luck
- the only protection offered for "ideas" is a patent but that can be very wide ranging. A patent is more than just "this is my idea and you can't use it" as the submissions that go with a patent application are worded in broad terms. As an example, if you had invented the car and wanted to protect it you would submit something describing a multi-wheeled vehicle with its own self contained power source of any description featuring enclosed or open seating for passengers and/or luggage space and in any configuration of wheels, seating etc Detailed submissions run on for pages and if the patent is granted then anything which is covered by the patent is a breach of your property rights and can be stopped by appropriate court action. So if you invented a petrol driven car your desription would be aimed at anything powered by every fuel imaginable including petrol, diesel, gas, nuclear power, rubber bands, pedals or any other means of propulsion
- some "ideas" are protected by copyright but this is limited to images and words. A story cannot be copyrighted but the way in which it is told or the pictures which accompany it can be. Even Shakespeare borrowed a few story lines from elsewhere.
- there are also trade marks but these are probably not relevant here. They can also be difficult to enforce. Peter Carter-Ruck once wrote to Private Eye on behalf of a client complaining that the magazine used "Biro" without acknowledging the trade mark attached to the name. PE's response was "what a sad way to make a living"
The best means I have seen for protecting an idea is to get whatever patent and/or copyright protection you can and then licence the benefit of the product to a manufacturer or distributer. As well as setting out what the company can do with the product it also covers things they can't do eg copy, reverse engineer, compete or undermine.
There is no perfect answer but the starting point is to protect what you have and work from there.
Good luck
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