Ovington Laser

Sailing Chandlery are selling LPE Lasers...

Originally posted by sandgrounder Originally posted by jeffers Originally posted by sandgrounder Originally posted by Sam.Spoons Who is the intellectual rights holder of the Laser design? We know LPE own the trademark for the Laser name and sail insignia... Designer Bruce Kirby sold the design rights to Global Sailing, a New Zealand company, which also owns PSA. All the current ILCA builders pay royalties to Global Sailing I thought that never completed and BKI were the ones who took LP to court? ILCA website, August 25, 2020:- "In addition to these fees, all builders will continue the ex gratis designer fee of $US50 per hull historically paid to Bruce Kirby Inc. This fee will now be paid to Global Sailing Ltd, which has purchased the assets of Bruce Kirby Inc."

Strange, I was racing against 3 Lasers today, and none of them cared less about any of this stuff.

It's all very complicated. LPE broke contracts which required them to pay royalties. ILCA then changed the class rules so LPE weren't required to honour contracts. That was when ILCA president was Heini Wellman, one of the TLC leaders. There aren't really IP rights to the Laser designs as such, which is why replica sails etc exist. Instead it was all covered by a mesh of overlapping contracts. LPE got sued for breaking contracts and lost big time, but in the meantime LPE were more or less disbanded, and Laser building transferred to LP Llc.

The Laser trademark is currently owned by yet another company in the same sort of ownership, called Velum IIRC so even if the Laser builder(s) go bust, as I should think is inevitable for the lawsuit losing ex builder LPE, the Trademark won't be available.



Edited by JimC - 18 Oct 20 at 11:53am

So, in theory, Global Sailing Ltd could refuse to let LPE build Lasers? Or refuse to let the ILCA build "the boat formerly known as Laser" should they so desire?