WORLDLINE_REGISTRATION_DOCUMENT_2017

The Group’s business Research and development, Patents and Licenses

Intellectual Property,

C.8.2

Going forward, the Group will be responsible for filing most of the trademarks or patents relating to the Group’s activity. The decision to file will be made in accordance with the Atos group’s intellectual property policy applied by the Group with respect to its own research and development projects, the primary objectives of which are the following: (i) to identify the intellectual property developed by the Group’s entities; (ii) to evaluate their potential and optimize their usage; (iii) to determine the form of protection best suited to the Group’s activity (for example, filing a patent or protecting the confidentiality of a trade secret); (iv) where necessary, to bring legal action against infringers and defend actions brought against the Group; and (v) to ensure that the Group remains independent with regard to intellectual property and that the majority of the intellectual property used by the Group belongs to it. In general, the Group grants licenses to use its intellectual property only on a very limited basis and only where the services provided to its clients require so. Similarly, the Group has entered into only a few material license agreements relating to technology belonging to third parties, including: (i) certain simple or cross-licenses entered into between Group entities, on the one hand, and certain Atos group entities, on the other hand; and (ii) a patent cross-license agreement entered into between Atos SE and IBM Corp., pursuant to which all the patents of IBM Corp. and its subsidiaries are licensed to the Atos group entities, including the Group’s entities, and the Atos group’s patents, including those of the Group, are, in return, licensed to IBM Corp. and its subsidiaries. In addition, from time to time, some Group entities use open-source software, which may be used free of charge under licenses that sometimes include an obligation to disclose the source code developed using the open-source software. The Atos group’s internal intellectual property policy provides that management must closely monitor such use from both a technical and a legal perspective in order to avoid the risks of unmonitored use of open-source software and disclosure of source codes relating to the Group’s proprietary software. The Group is involved in a small number of material legal disputes relating to intellectual property, as described in Section F.6, “Legal Proceedings”.

Patents, License, Usage Rights, and Other Intangible Assets

The Group owns most of the intellectual property that it uses in connection with its activity. As a result, the Group is usually able to develop its own technological solutions and to provide its products and services to clients without depending on the Atos group, competitors or other third parties. The Group’s intellectual property rights comprise a combination of complementary rights, including the following: Rights relating to technology, such as: ● Know-how and trade secrets whose confidentiality is ● ensured by the Group’s internal policy as well as by contractual provisions that are binding on the persons or entities with access to such information, Software and information systems (which are protected by ● copyright) and databases. In accordance with the Atos group’s intellectual property policy, most of such software has been registered for copyright protection purposes, A portfolio of approximately 80 patents, filed in the ● geographic markets where the Group is most active, including Europe, the United States, Canada and India; Rights to distinctive marks such as trademarks or domain ● names, in particular those including the name “Worldline”, registered in all of the countries where the Group does business. These intellectual property rights are held either (i) by Worldline Luxembourg SA; or (ii) by the Group entity that developed the technology in question (which is the Company, for certain patents) or that uses the distinctive marks locally.

C

69

Worldline 2017 Registration Document

Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online