Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co > Tel Aviv, Israel > Firm Profile

Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co > Firm Profile

Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co. is one of Israel’s oldest and most experienced intellectual property law firms.

Established nearly seven decades ago, our firm has earned its position as a market leader and legal authority on all aspects of IP law with a commitment to uncompromising quality, impeccable ethics, and a sharp professional focus.

As a specialized firm, we work in complete synergy to ensure that our clients receive the most in-depth and insightful response to their legal needs. Whether directly handling cases or providing professional guidance and supervision to our advocates and attorneys, our firm’s principal leaders are involved and engaged in each case as needed.

Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co. has achieved international recognition for its premium litigation services offered by litigators who provide pre-litigation counseling, ex-parte injunctive relief solutions, full-scale litigation, and appeal procedures and are well-versed in all forms of litigation in Israeli courts. Our team of IP experts includes advocates, patent attorneys, and highly experienced paralegal assistants to provide a complete and wide-ranging scope of services, including:

Litigation
Patents: We represent patent holders and alleged infringers in patent infringement actions tried before the District Courts. Our firm also represents clients in appeals to District Court judgments in infringement cases. Such appeals are heard and decided by the Supreme Court of Israel. Litigation services also comprise various proceedings before the Registrar of Patents. These include, but are not limited to oppositions, applications for revocation of patents, and compulsory license proceedings. In patent cases, our clients benefit from a synergetic collaboration between the lawyers and patent lawyers at our firm.This partnership enables us to address complex and challenging patent law matters involving technological and legal issues.

Trademarks: Our team has acquired extensive litigation experience, including numerous cases involving trademark infringement and passing-off actions.  We have litigated some of the most significant cases in the country, thus contributing to the Israeli judicial system in these fields.  Our firm is also involved in trade dress cases and domain name disputes.

Other litigation proceedings, such as oppositions, cancellation of trademarks, and proceedings concerning rival applications for similar trademarks in respect of the same goods, are argued before the Registrar of Trademarks. We handle such cases extensively and frequently appear before the Registrar of Trademarks frequently.

Copyrights: During the seven decades since our establishment, Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co. has been involved in major and significant copyright cases in varying fields. Some examples of these cases included musical and literary works, dramatic and artistic works, photographic, cinematographic, architectural works, and copyright in computer software and copyrights in technical drawings. Our firm has gained vast experience enforcing various copyrights,  representing the Israeli Performing Rights Society for many years. It has filed claims on behalf of authors regarding their moral rights. Counseling Israel’s performing rights society for decades, we have acquired considerable expertise in complex issues of copyright collective management, and anti-trust matters. Our firm also deals with copyright issues involving copyrights in the “new media”. Most copyright cases involve injunctions and restraining orders and are heard by the District Courts, and many of these cases begin with temporary injunction proceedings. We have also gained extensive experience in copyright litigation.

Prosecution
Patents: The level of competition in international business is on the rise, and the outcome of victory versus loss is often determined by the quality and scope of each competitor’s intellectual property rights. Our ability to positively affect the value of our client’s business and competitive position proves significant time and again. We are committed to helping our clients maximize their intellectual property potential and defend it against any possible challenge that may arise. Our experience and in-depth expertise as an IP litigation firm enables us to avoid the pitfalls of patent applications that are often drafted too narrowly, provide little flexibility to avoid unforeseen prior art, or make enforcement litigation unnecessarily complicated or expensive. We are confident in our firm capabilities to translate technical and complex issues into comprehensive and sound business decisions.

Nowadays, more than ever before, patents must be prepared while maintaining a clear view of potential litigation and a keen understanding of the legal principles governing the interpretation and enforcement of patents.

Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co. files patent applications in Israel on behalf of local inventors, overseas corporations, and others, prosecuting such applications until patents are granted. Our firm also acts on behalf of local inventors, assisting them in securing their rights in foreign countries by filing international applications under the PCT.

As a law firm specializing in intellectual property law, we benefit from the extensive experience of our patent department team. These individuals provide holistic legal services to inventors and owners of patents and can provide support drafting the application, during the prosecution process, opposition proceedings and during infringement proceedings.

Trademarks: In today’s increasingly global business arena, branding strategy plays a significant role. As distribution channels, such as the Internet, allow businesses to market themselves to a worldwide consumer public, the ability to protect brand identities is crucial. Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co. assists in acquiring and protecting trademarks and brand identities, both locally and internationally. Throughout the years, we have acquired extensive experience in all commercial areas concerning trademarks, trade dress, and domain names.

Our services include, amongst others, counseling clients on branding strategies and the initial selection of a mark or design, conducting trademark availability searches and opinions, filing trademark applications, and prosecuting them until the registration procedure is complete. We are highly skilled in managing large-scale global portfolios of trademarks and expertly guide clients regarding the optimal strategy for building such a portfolio, maintaining it, and enforcing the rights protected by these trademarks.

Designs: Our firm files applications to register designs for local and foreign clients and prosecutes such applications until designs are granted. We leverage our broad experience in industrial design litigation when formulating filing and prosecution strategies for our clients. Israel has just enacted a new Designs Act, which came into force in August 2018, replacing an archaic British ordinance from 1924, and introducing significant changes to design protection. The law is entirely new, and judicature has yet to be developed. Our experience and in-depth understanding of IP laws and IP litigation help us to guide our clients through the new system, and we advise our clients on how to derive maximum benefits from the new law.

Counseling
IP matters: In the new global economy, extracting significant value from intellectual property assets is vital for any business success. We believe it is our responsibility to help our clients develop comprehensive IP protection plans that take full advantage of patents, trade secrets, trademarks, trade dress, domain names, copyrights, and other forms of intellectual property. We advise clients on all intellectual property matters, including examining the patentability of inventions, conducting patent and trademark searches, protecting goodwill, and registering trademarks and designs, and copyright matters. Today, we increasingly find ourselves advising our large-scale clients regarding the strategy of constructing their trademark portfolio in Israel and abroad. This is conducted with our ongoing consulting pertaining to the question of whether or not a piece of music may be used in an advertisement they are creating or if a particular text can be integrated into their website. The following week, we may be working to protect them against a troll patent claim and are requested to protect a particular packaging design or new product stand designed by our client. In today’s dynamic and wide-ranging business environment, we can offer an agile and comprehensive array of services that answer our clients’ extensive and complex needs as they face new and continuously changing challenges on a routine basis. Our extensive expertise and in-depth capabilities enable us to provide a professional platform backed by a sense of confidence and full command of the current legal landscape in which these clients are working.

Since its establishment, Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co.has participated in the process of enacting the most relevant legislation addressed by the parliamentary committees in Israel.  Our firm has drafted bills of new Acts and Amendments to existing Acts in various IP fields in Israel for clients, and has also represented our client’s interests in the course of the legislating procedure, appearing before Committees of the Knesset (the Israeli parliament).

Exposed to so many facets of intellectual property law and related business practices, we are well-versed in counseling clients on how to secure and exploit IP rights in a manner that is aligned with their enterprise’s business objectives.

Copyrights: Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co. offers a full range of services relating to the protection of copyrights. Copyright protects the key rights defined by numerous entities, from individual creators and artists all the way to large-scale industries, from software to games to music, each of which raises issues related to protection, licensing, and enforcement. We specialize in copyright matters, advise clients on copyrightable matters, and draft contracts and agreements accordingly. Throughout the years, we have also developed a specialized focus on copyright issues pertaining to entertainment law, representing numerous authors, including musicians, writers, photographers, painters, and sculptors. We also handle issues of the Internet and other new media. Our attorneys assist clients in enforcing copyrights and against claims of infringement brought forth by others.

Trade secrets: There are cases in which trade secret protection can prove a more effective means for a company to benefit from its technological know-how than actual patent protection. This form of protection requires special precautions to preserve strict confidentiality, without which a trade secret cannot exist. According to the law, the trade secret must provide a trade advantage to its owner for it to be protected as a trade secret.

Having fought some serious battles over this issue, Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co. has in-depth expertise regarding trade secrets and procedures for establishing and safeguarding trade secret know-how.  Our team has comprehensive experience drafting confidentiality agreements with employees, suppliers, customers, and strategic partners. The present environment of employee mobility and increasingly complex business relationships requires policing potential uses of trade secrets by competitors. We also help clients with the exploitation of trade secrets by drafting non-disclosure agreements (NDA) and know-how license agreements and advise our clients on how to keep their trade secrets, enforce their rights in such secrets, and avoid infringing on the trade secret rights of others.

Lawyer Profiles

Photo	Name	Position	Profile
	Dr Ronnie Benshafut	Senior Partner, Head of Patent Practice	View Profile
	Adv Ehud Gabrieli	Co-Managing Partner	View Profile
	Adv Nahum Gabrieli	Co-Managing Partner	View Profile
	Dr Eva Gak	Partner	View Profile
	Adv Gal Gross	Partner	View Profile
	Adv Gerald Kain	Patent Attorney and Advocate	View Profile
	Adv Yael Kalmanovich	Partner	View Profile
	Adv Hila Oz Meyer	Partner	View Profile
	Mr Alfred Thee	Senior Patent Attorney (Of Counsel), head of Patent Department	View Profile

Seligsohn Gabrieli & Co > Firm Profile

Leveraging decades of international patent experience, we lead our clients through intricate patent processes, transforming ideas into valuable, tangible business assets.

Each patent is a unique world that requires a profound understanding of both technology and patent law. We accompany clients throughout all the stages needed to secure and leverage their patents for business success. We conduct each process with sharpened senses and a strong professional compass, protecting clients’ assets every step of the way. Our patent services merge our professional proficiency and comprehensive capabilities with our commitment to establishing strong, trust-based relationships with our clients. Processes are carefully defined and detailed as we strategically navigate through the patent world on their behalf. Decisions are made with full dedication to our client’s goals as we consider varying landscapes, intricacies of diverse industries, technological developments, consumer behaviors, global trends, and projections. 

Our ability to provide business landscaping services allows our clients to fully grasp the business arena they are operating in and identify technological “white spots” based on a profound understanding of their competitors’ endeavors, and the trends occurring within relevant sectors and geographical areas.  With expertise in the fields of life sciences and chemistry, as well as materials, pharmaceuticals and medical devices, diagnostics, agriculture, cannabis, green technologies, water technologies, and nanotechnologies, as well as in physics, electronics, computer sciences, and engineering, amongst others, we know it is our responsibility to fully immerse ourselves in the subject at hand so that we can pave the path to success with confident strides and conviction. 

Our extensive experience, combined with our cooperation with our group’s IP law firm, Seligsohn, Gabrieli & Co., enables us to lead a wide-ranging patent strategy on behalf of our clients, supported by all aspects of IP law services, which includes both registered and non-registered IP as well as trade secrets. This synergetic approach provides our clients with a comprehensive professional vantage point, and a bona fide arsenal of services and tools required to set their strategy into action successfully.

We help you stand out.

Consultation: Owning a unique patent is vital for any business that aims to thrive. We help our clients develop comprehensive patent protection plans that enable them to accomplish their business goals and secure a unique market position. Our consultation services are determined according to each case and include ongoing guidance regarding their patent matters. These include examining the patentability of inventions, conducting patent searches, and attending to all requirements for filing and protecting the patent portfolio in Israel and abroad. Our consultation services are wide-ranging yet client-focused, and we always consider the circumstances impacting our clients’ patents, and their optimal route for long-term success. Our strategic thinking and business savvy approach mean we are more than consultants. We are passionate, highly committed professionals who define the best strategy according to the client’s goals and ideas, identify the optimal path, and lead the way. 

Filing and prosecution: Translating technical and often complex issues into comprehensive and sound business decisions, we are committed to helping our clients maximize their patent potential and defend them against any possible challenges that may arise. Our experience and in-depth expertise enable us to avoid the pitfalls of patent applications that are often drafted too narrowly, provide limited flexibility, or make enforcement litigation unnecessarily complicated or expensive. Now, more than ever before, patents must be prepared while maintaining a clear view of potential litigation, along with a keen understanding of the legal principles governing the interpretation and enforcement of patents.

Seligsohn, Gabrieli & Benshafrut files patent applications in Israel on behalf of local inventors, as well as for local and overseas corporations and other persons, prosecuting such applications until patents are granted. We also act on behalf of local inventors and technology-based corporations, assisting them in securing their rights in foreign countries by filing international applications under the PCT or via direct national filing routes. Our clients also benefit from the added value of legal services provided by our group’s IP law firm, Seligsohn, Gabrieli & Co, in drafting the application and during the prosecution process, opposition proceedings, and infringement proceedings, enabling us to optimally address complex and challenging patent matters which involve both technological and legal issues. We represent both patent holders and alleged infringers in patent infringement actions tried before the District Courts. 

We also represent clients in appeals on District Court judgments in infringement cases. Such appeals are heard and decided by the Supreme Court of Israel. Litigation services also comprise various proceedings before the Registrar of Patents. These include, but are not limited to, oppositions, applications for revocation of patents, and compulsory license proceedings. 

Our ability is to provide extensive patent services supported and propelled by a profound understanding of diverse and cutting-edge technologies. We are very proud of this truly remarkable asset and are honored to share it with our clients. Our collaboration with Seligsohn, Gabrieli, and Co. is built-in and synergistic monumental and positions us as an unparalleled patent practice that has a solid stronghold within the innovative Israeli technology sector, backed by a leading IP services firm.  We recognize the value we bring to our clients through our knowledge, experience, insights, and combined competencies – which can mean the difference between success and failure, surviving or thriving. 

Patent term extension: The patent term extension (PTE) process in Israel is highly intricate. During the last ten years, the Israeli Patent Law of 1976 has undergone multiple amendments, resulting in PTE provisions that are sometimes unclear and ambiguous. 

Extension Orders in Israel pertain to two sectors: pharmaceutical products containing an active ingredient upon their initial registration in the Israeli Pharmaceutical Registry and medical devices under certain terms. The decision to issue an Extension Order depends, among other things, on the approval to market the pharmaceutical product, and the existence of a corresponding Extension Order in the US and the EU.    

Leveraging our proficiency in handling PTE applications in Israel, our services include ongoing legal advice, application drafting and examining, representation before all tribunals and courts in Israel, litigation, and other services. Working in collaboration within our group with Seligsohn, Gabrieli & Co. provides additional legal support for our clients with a wide array of legal services in all aspects of intellectual property.  Our joined capabilities benefit our clients in the pharmaceutical industry, who receive a legal solution which is tailored to their specific needs and requirements.

Patentability and FTO: Freedom to Operate (FTO) refers to the liberty to leverage a product in a certain country without the risk of infringing on third-party rights in that country. As many companies discover, having a patent does not guarantee the ability to exploit it, as third parties may have certain prior IP rights that may prevent the company from placing their product on the market. 

A comprehensive FTO search is the best way to minimize the risk of IP rights infringement and enable managers to make informed decisions before taking risks. This entails locating relevant IP rights in the target country or countries, and determining the level of risk these rights present. The scope of any FTO search is largely dependent on the investment in developing and bringing the product to market. The bigger the investment in the product ‒ the more thorough the FTO search should be. It is important to note that no FTO search provides 100% protection, but the more effort is invested in the search, the more protection it offers. Our firm ensures optimal FTO searches are conducted when necessary, protecting our clients’ rights in any country and industry.