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Consumer Products

Consumer Products

Key Contacts

Cambodia

Indonesia

Laos

Myanmar

Thailand

Vietnam

OVERVIEW

Helping you bring
world-class products to the fast-growing markets of Southeast Asia.

The consumer products team at Tilleke & Gibbins will partner with you across all stages of commercializing your product in Southeast Asia.

At the concept and design stage, we help protect your innovation through patent and trademark services, and pave the way for market entry and product launches through market surveys and commercialization services.

At the realization stage, we work with you to secure favorable manufacturing and warehousing deals, enter into joint ventures with trusted local partners, and navigate the regulatory and labelling regimes to ensure that your products are compliant and profitable. When manufacturing is underway, we advise on labor and employment matters on an ongoing basis, and on the vital licensing, distribution, and franchising agreements to get your products to market worldwide.

In the unlikely event that anything goes wrong, our dispute resolution team is on hand to help protect your market position and reputation. We have worked with some of the world’s largest brands to carry out product recalls and to defend against consumer litigation, including class actions.

With a unified multidisciplinary team that understands your product from step one, you can rest assured that your business in Southeast Asia is in good hands.

Experience

  • Retained by one of Southeast Asia’s largest manufacturers of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages to handle their trademark portfolio and labelling requirements across all six of our jurisdictions.
  • Represented the Myanmar subsidiary of a Thai garment manufacturer with over 4,000 total employees in preparing a successful appeal for a complex and highly publicized arbitration between our client and 260 of their employees in Myanmar in relation to a massive strike based on 23 labor demands including wage increase, skills bonus, full-time jobs for temporary staff, and shuttle transportation, among others.
  • Advised the Thai subsidiary of a major Japanese automaker on a number of claims related to allegedly defective airbags.
    The claimants argued that they were injured after airbags deployed with excessive force when they were involved in accidents while driving the automaker’s vehicles. The claimants claimed damages and demanded that our client initiated recalls of its vehicles in Thailand. Through our representation, all cases were successfully settled for a nominal amount.
  • Our franchising practice is one of the most active in Southeast Asia, assisting clients with every stage of bringing their franchises to the region, providing preliminary advice on regulations, market entry, and trademark protection; drafting, advising on, and translating franchise disclosure documents and franchise agreements to file for registration with local regulators; and providing ongoing advice once the local franchises have been sold and established.
  • Retained to advise a world-leading multinational luxury goods corporation on a wide range of corporate and commercial matters related to their business operations in Thailand, including the establishment and operation of it’s retail operations in Bangkok’s luxury malls, and the recent closure of a snake farm in Thailand.
  • Advising a multinational food manufacturing company on their plans to launch a contest in which Thai consumers would be entitled to participate. As the contest operator is domiciled in Singapore and the company’s Thai affiliate is not involved, they initially approached us about the general legal implications of a foreign entity administering such a contest. This uncovered complex Thai tax implications on the prizes that would be awarded under the contest. We advised the client on the various rules and regulations that they need to be aware of in order to run their contest and remain fully compliant with Thai tax laws.
  • Retained by the world’s largest coffee chain to enforce its IP rights in Cambodia and Laos by continuously monitoring the Cambodian market, providing our client with sighting reports, and taking action to prevent the dissemination of counterfeits in the country.
  • Representing one of the world’s largest producers and sellers of vitamins, minerals and nutritional supplements in claims before the Thai Customs Department om a dispute over the application of internationally accepted rules of origin in calculating whether products imported for distribution in Thailand qualify for tax exemptions under ASEAN member trade agreements. Significantly, this matter involves complexity in the interpretation of rules of origin, as only significantly small percentages of our client’s product ingredients originate from countries not subject to tax exemptions.
  • Advised Red Bull, a leading energy drink maker, on an intercompany trademark license registration between Red Bull AG and Red Bull Asia FZE. The client wanted to update the addendum to an existing agreement to include Red Bull’s entire Indonesian trademark portfolio.
  • Tilleke & Gibbins regularly organizes product identification training sessions across Southeast Asia for our IP practitioners and clients to come together and train local officers on how to differentiate genuine products from counterfeit products for some of the world’s leading brand owners. Through these events, we help support educational programs, enhance border control measures, strengthen IP protection for our clients, and build collaborative relationships with officials from the operational to the executive level.
  • Representing a Brazilian footwear manufacturer in enforcement action to prevent online counterfeiting in Cambodia.

PROFESSIONALS

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