Leighton Cassidy

Partner, Fieldfisher

Leighton Cassidy is Co-head of Fieldfisher's IP and Technology, Protection and Enforcement Department. He has over 20 years' domestic and international experience advising clients in relation to their intellectual property and commercial requirements.

Leighton works across multiple industry sectors including major consumer and fashion brands, energy and natural resources, financial institutions; hotels and leisure, retail, life sciences and healthcare, sport, technology, media and telecommunications. This includes worldwide trade mark and design clearance, filing and prosecution; contentious registry proceedings throughout the world; trade mark licensing, exploitation and commercialisation; settlement, co-existence agreements and dispute resolution, managing IP litigation internationally.

Leighton represents household name clients in protecting their brands from infringement and regularly works for clients in the UK and EU, North America, the Middle East, China and the Far East and Asia Pacific. He is an active committee member of the International Trademark Association (INTA) and currently sit on the INTA Bulletin committee. He is recommended in the legal directories and specialist intellectual property press for IP and trade mark work, particularly in relation to telecoms clients. He is described in Legal 500 as "able to understand business needs and come back with effective solutions". He is also a listed expert in The International Who's Who of Trademarks Lawyers.

Leighton has spoken widely at industry events and commented in and published articles in Intellectual Property Magazine, WTR, Managing IP and WIPR and Fieldfisher's own highly-regarded IP blog, 'SnIPpets'. He also led the team that won the Managing IP EMEA Trade Mark Prosecution (UK Law Firms) Award 2019.

Contributed to

1

Protection and management of designs—a practical guide

Practice notes

This Practice Note sets out practical guidance and tips to enable proprietors of UK registered and unregistered designs and registered and unregistered Community (EU) designs to ensure that their designs benefit from the protection available. The considerations include qualification criteria, how best to represent a design in the application, evidence, timing and grace periods, and ownership and assertion of rights. It includes references to the guidance issued by the UK Intellectual Property Office and EU Intellectual Property Office and to considerations arising from the Supreme Court’s decision in the Trunki case (PMS International Limited v Magmatic Limited [2016] UKSC 12).