Licence agreements.
An author's economic rights arise automatically, but they do not pass to the commissioning party on their own. Without a licence agreement they stay with the author, even after you have paid for the work.
We prepare copyright licence agreements, copyright assignment agreements, agreements on the use of a work and publishing contracts so that it is clear who may use the work, in what territory, for how long and on what conditions. We cover graphics, text, photographs, music and software. The aim is that the rights to what you have paid for genuinely belong to you, and that this holds up in due diligence on an investment or a sale.
Rights that genuinely belong to you once you have paid.
An invoice from a designer or developer is not a copyright assignment. Without an agreement you are left with only a limited right to use the work.
Licence or assignment, as the case requires
Czech law does not allow copyright to be sold outright, but the exercise of the rights can be assigned or an exclusive copyright licence granted. We choose the construction that gives you the control you need.
Scope with no gaps
The agreement has to set out the territory, the term, the manner of use and the right to modify the work and pass it on. A gap in any of these shows up the moment you want to use the work in a way the original deal did not foresee.
Employees and external creators alike
With employee works the employer usually exercises the rights, but with external contractors and freelancers it does not, unless the contract says so. We handle both, so that works flow to where they belong.
Ready for due diligence
An investor or a buyer running a review first checks whether the company owns what it presents. We build the documentation so that this question has a clear answer.
Complete handling of rights to content and code.
Copyright licence agreements: exclusive and non-exclusive
We prepare exclusive and non-exclusive copyright licences with a clearly defined scope, territory, term and fee. We explain what a copyright licence is and how it differs from an assignment, and we also prepare a software licence and its licensing on to further users. Suited to cases where you want to use the work but do not need full control over it.
Assignment of the exercise of economic copyright rights
When you need maximum control over a work, we prepare a copyright assignment agreement, meaning an assignment of the exercise of economic rights to the extent the law allows, including the right to modify the work and pass it on.
Works from employees and external creators
We handle the rights to works created for you by employees, freelancers and suppliers, so that the fruits of the work belong to the company and not to the author.
Software and licence terms
For software we link copyright protection with licence terms and the handling of source code, and we advise on open source software and on licences such as the GPL licence, so that it is clear who owns the code and who may use it.
Use of music, photographs and text
We sort out rights to the content you use in marketing, on the web or in products, from stock material to commissioned work, so that no one can later call your use into question.
Independent international rankings repeatedly place Ambit among the leading law firms.
Lucie Máchová
Lucie Máchová is a Senior Associate at Ambit, providing comprehensive legal support to startups and technology companies throughout all growth stages, from establishing business relationships and protecting intellectual property rights to resolving complex employment matters and managing strategic litigation. She studied law at Charles University in Prague (Mgr., JUDr.) and has been admitted to the Czech Bar since 2014.