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ARTICLE · 04 SEPTEMBER 2026

Exhaustion Of IP Rights And Parallel Imports – A Refresher

Lewis Silkin
Lewis Silkin
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Lewis Silkin

Lewis Silkin

Joint managing partners: Jo Farmer, Richard Miskella International offices: Dublin, Hong Kong...

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Whether you're a rights holder trying to protect your pricing and distribution networks from parallel imports and the second-hand market, or a business that resells, repackages or parallel imports genuine third-party goods, you need to understand IP exhaustion.

GlobalIntellectual Property
Chris Rycroft
Chris Rycroft
Victoria Owrid
Victoria Owrid
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Whether you're a rights holder trying to protect your pricing and distribution networks from parallel imports and the second-hand market, or a business that resells, repackages or parallel imports genuine third-party goods, you need to understand IP exhaustion.

This note introduces the key concepts of "IP exhaustion" and "parallel imports", and explains why the UK government's 2025 decision to retain our "UK+" exhaustion regime matters. It also examines recent UK and European cases showing how these principles play out in practice, including a July 2026 Court of Appeal case which confirms how exhaustion can apply to some kinds of downloadable software.

Basic principles of IP Exhaustion

Our suggestion is that the most helpful way to think about Exhaustion of IP Rights is like this:

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