Branding Rights: Trade Marks, Passing Off & Brand Enforcement

A recorded webinar. Duration 1 hour 45 mins

Speaker: Iain Connor, Partner, Michelmores

Introduction

Brand value is often a business’s most important asset. Yet many organisations fail to anticipate the risks, loopholes and strategic opportunities in developing, protecting and enforcing their brand.

This recorded masterclass provides a practical, litigation-aware guide to trade marks, passing off and brand protection strategies. Starting with the core legal principles, the session builds into a fully developed approach to branding strategy — including registration tactics, infringement analysis, enforcement options and how to avoid the expensive pitfalls that can destroy brand value.

Packed with real-world examples, war stories, success cases and cautionary tales from private practice, the session moves from foundational principles to the latest case law and modern brand-enforcement challenges.

If you want a fast, authoritative and highly engaging overview of how brands are built, protected and defended in 2026, this recorded webinar is for you.

Who is this for? 

This on demand webinar is designed for:

• Solicitors and barristers specialising in intellectual property or commercial law

• In-house counsel responsible for brand protection, compliance or marketing oversight

• Anyone advising on trade marks, brand risk, reputation, or enforcement strategy

Learning Outcomes

By the end of the webinar, delegates will be able to:

• Understand the essential elements of trade mark infringement and passing off

• Identify the strengths and vulnerabilities of a brand strategy

• Recognise the parallel strategies available for brand protection (registration, commercial controls, policing, monitoring)

• Evaluate enforcement options, including cease-and-desist approaches, settlement dynamics and litigation choices

• Apply lessons from key cases, both historic and current, to real-world client situations

• Avoid common branding mistakes that lead to costly disputes or weakened rights

• Confidently advise clients on proactive and defensive tactics in brand management

Topics Covered

1. Foundations of Trade Mark Rights

• What can and cannot be registered

• Distinctiveness, descriptiveness and how to strengthen a mark

• Key infringement tests: identity, likelihood of confusion, unfair advantage, dilution

2. Passing Off — The Classic Trinity

• Goodwill, misrepresentation and damage

• Modern adaptations of the test

• When passing off succeeds where trade mark infringement fails

3. Building a Fully Formed Branding Strategy

• Creating enforceable rights through market behaviour

• Clearance searches and early-stage risk analysis

• Choosing trade mark classes and territories

• Problems with brand extensions

4. Enforcement in Practice

• Cease-and-desist letters that actually work

• Online infringements and social-media brand misuse

5. Parallel Strategies for Brand Protection

• Monitoring systems and proactive policing

• Working with platforms, registries and enforcement bodies

6. War Stories: Successes & Spectacular Failures

• Examples from practice

• Famous cases where branding protection collapsed

• Lessons for advisers

Price and Booking Details

Price: £99 + VAT

• Full recording of the session

• Downloadable slides

• Certificate of attendance (on request)

To order the recording, simply click the registration button at the top right. 

Presented by:

Iain Connor is a leading practitioner in the field of intellectual property with more than 25 years' experience in private practice. He leads Michelmores' intellectual property practice having prosecuted many of the UK’s most high profile pieces of IP litigation through the UK courts and then on to the Court of Justice of the European Union. Of his European Court highlights, he was awarded both "Managing IP Award's UK Trade Mark Litigation Team of the Year" and "The Lawyer's IP team of the Year" for his work representing Interflora in its landmark case against Marks & Spencer – the first UK trade mark infringement case relating to the use of the Interflora trade mark as an AdWord in the Google advertising programme. 

Iain helps clients to protect and exploit their intellectual property and disrupt the status quo by looking where technology, innovation and IPR adds value and delivers change. As a result he has many legal firsts including the first database right case to decide who owns the right to exploit data derived from business operations; the first copyright case to define the right to observe, study and test third party software, the first copyright case to establish that a "film" could not be a "dramatic work"; the first case to analyse what amounts to taking unfair advantage of a trade mark; and the first case to use Google analytics to demonstrate how consumers engage with online platforms.

Important Notes about Booking

Payment can be made by credit or debit card or alternatively by invoice. In the latter case payment will need to be cleared before the link to watch the webinar is released

The option to pay by invoice is below the pay by card option in the booking form

The Legal Training Consultancy

The Legal Training Consultancy is a full-service training consultancy with a large portfolio of conferences, courses and trainers. Over the years we have been responsible for putting together a vast number of law and management related conferences, webinars, seminars, videos and e-learning modules. Altogether substantially more than 2000.