On Friday, June 11, 2021, Withers joined female-focused start-up accelerator organizations Springboard Enterprises and New York Fashion Tech Lab to co-host a virtual event on the topic of legal considerations for emerging and established fashion tech companies. Attendees joined from all over the world, including London, Australia, India, Canada and the US to learn about and discuss intellectual property, data privacy, corporate, investment and other international legal considerations relevant to fashion tech companies.
The session, titled ‘Fashion tech law: A global perspective’, was part of the 2021 New York Fashion Tech Lab. Gina Bibby, head of Withers’ global fashion tech practice co-moderated and was joined from Withers by London-based corporate partner and chair of Withers’ global luxury brands group, Graham Webster, intellectual property and technology partner in London, Kenneth Mullen, and special counsel and lead of the Italian intellection property and technology team in Milan, Jacopo Liguori.
In the first internationally-focused workshop conducted by NYFTL, the speakers discussed critical legal issues for fashion and fashion tech start-ups around the world, and covered topics ranging from capital investing, protecting intellectual property and approach to data privacy when involving multiple jurisdictions.
Top considerations for fashion tech companies with global ambitions
Graham highlighted common mistakes founders make when taking money from investors, encouraging founders to consider what they personally want before rushing into investment opportunities. Gina and Kenneth emphasized best practices for protecting proprietary ideas of the founders and start-ups when pitching to investors and prioritizing intellectual property protection in the early stages. Jacopo answered questions on data privacy when a company’s data is processed across jurisdictions and shared considerations and potential consequences of noncompliance. The interactive session included many questions from attendees, who remarked it was a “great session” and they found it “very helpful.”
In the end, all the speakers agreed that one of the most important considerations for fashion tech start-ups is intellectual property protection in the proper jurisdictions.
This event continues Withers’ proud support of female founders and female-led fashion tech companies.
