de Chalains IP (La Lucia)

de Chalains® is a top tier Intellectual Property (IP) law firm. The firm is dedicated to providing our clients throughout Africa and globally with an integrated, responsive and personal range of superior IP services at affordable cost.

Our Service areas include:

• Trade Mark portfolio management, IP Audits and due diligences.
• Trade mark, Patent, Design and Company searches locally, abroad and in neighbouring countries.
• Trade mark, Patent and Design registrations in South Africa, overseas, and surrounding African countries.
• Formality work including assignments, amendments, licenses, registered user recordals, watching services.
• Trade mark, Patent, Design and Copyright litigation.
• Trade mark, Patent, Design and Copyright opinions.
• Infringement, cancellation and validity opinions.
• Anti-Counterfeiting.
• Valuations and commercial assessment of IP.
• Formation and reservation of Companies.
• Consumer Protection matters.
• Advertising Standards Authority (ASA).
• Plant Breeders Rights.
• Domain name registration and protection.

Why choose de Chalains?

Our client base is varied and continues to grow. We are however not saturated by a surplus of clients enabling us to provide and sustain unprecedented levels of service excellence. 

We receive regular instructions from corporates (including listed companies), attorneys, trade mark agents, search houses and businesses, both locally and abroad. Moreover, we represent clients across a broad range of sectors including international rugby and football teams, prominent cricket supporter clubs and clients in the automotive, 4×4, gaming, e-commerce, financial, electronics, pharmaceutical, cosmetics, education, entertainment, wine, whiskeys, nutritional products, furniture and retail, tourism,  computer and internet industries, to mention but a few.

Further reasons to choose de Chalains® may be summarised as follows:

• Unrivalled turn-around time and responsiveness in respect of providing opinions on the registrability of searches, both locally and abroad

• Advice given is timely, clear and commercially focused; we anticipate opportunities and problems and advise on options and alternatives to assist you in making sound commercial decisions in managing your trade marks

• Cost effective without the expenses, untimeliness, over-servicing and delegation difficulties that may be experienced through large firms

• Smaller client base increases chances of avoiding awkward conflict of interest situations

• The ability to have access to dedicated IP attorneys’ supported by a highly proficient professional team

• International capability and established network of associates

• An exceptional trade mark management system and secure web-enabled access to your trade mark portfolio and technical backup, infrastructure and support

• A budget planning facility (also web-enabled) enabling you to estimate the costs of a particular trade mark over a period of time

• Access to watching services alerting us of possible infringing marks to be sifted by our professionals and then only relayed to yourselves if we are of the view that there are sound strategic and/or commercial reasons to pursue opposition

WTR 1000
We are delighted to inform our clients that we have been internationally recognised by World Trademark Review (WTR 1000) – February 2021 – 2024 as one of the leading and recommended Trade Mark Law Firms in South Africa.  The WTR 1000 identifies individual and firm expertise in all areas of trade mark law and practise and is the defining go-to-resource for those seeking legal trade mark expertise.