During the last decade, more cases of IP theft have occurred than ever before, costing one party or another a lot of money, time and no doubt, concern.

IP theft can be described as a simple click on a computer mouse, or a substantial well planned physical exercise depending on the IP itself. There have been some very large-scale court cases involving companies worth billions of pounds. IP often starts out as an inspirational idea for a business, only to end up in courtroom, where evidence is being assessed to determine who actually owns it.

In other cases, such as a case that we operated on in London & Europe, it was a clear case of breach of contract. Proving theft in these instances is a process of discovering the owned IP beyond the alleged owner's business control.

Worse than not knowing if the IP is being used elsewhere to promote other businesses, especially competitors, is discovering former business acquaintances implementing it into their own new ventures. In this case, evidence suggested that former employees had chosen to align themselves with a former business partner, who jointly created the IP but did not own it. Linking associated people in the case finally determined how the IP formula was copied, taken and used to create a competitive entity, which breached contracts of ownership & trading.