Legal Challenge, Summit 2023 and embracing the open source

Welcome to newsletter #98!

With this issue, we switch to a new engine: the open source platform Ghost that uses the old-school pay-to-use model, without any ads. We look forward to using its extended features as we try provide entertainment the brief period between your visits to Vilnius. If you're new around here, or if you recently changed your email, you can subscribe to the newsletter here.

And now, on to the news –

LEGAL CHALLENGE 2023

Returning for the sixth time

Games industry's premier moot court returns for the sixth time! The schedule, as well as other information, is here.

This year's case

This year's case is about a studio that bought another studio's games IP, with a carve-out for their existing licensing deal with another publisher. A bit later, the seller got dissolved. And a bit later still, the buyer discovered that the original publisher keeps selling the product. Are royalties owed? Check the case here!

Who wrote the case?

The credit goes to Alexandros Alexandrou, Anastasia (Stacey) Chuvaeva, Darya Firsava, Tamara Sakolchyk and Katya Nemova, with thanks to Paul Gardner and his team at Wiggin for proofreading the materials, and to the general counsel of Wargaming and partners at MSK for allowing their colleagues the luxury of working on this case.

Relevance

This year's issue is especially relevant because it's based on 2 actual business cases, one of which got resolved while the other is currently about to enter litigation (or settlement, who knows?). This ain't no theory, people! This is real life.

A stellar judge panel

This year's judge panel is headed by Christian Rauda –  a professor of law, and a veteran games industry lawyer from Hamburg 🇩🇪. Dr. Rauda is joined by 11 professionals from all over the world:

🇺🇸 Karin Pagnanelli, partner at MSK (Los Angeles)
🇱🇹 Katya Nemova, deputy GC at Wargaming (Vilnius )
🇧🇷 Joyce Alves, partner at DCA (São Paolo)
🇵🇱 Monika Gebel, lead IP Counsel at People Can Fly (Warsaw)
🇸🇬 Meryl Koh, director/IP & Dispute Resolution at Drew & Napier (Singapore)
🇺🇸 Chris Ponder, partner at SheppardMullin (San Francisco)
🇮🇹 Luca Guidobaldi, partner at ADVANT Nctm (Rome)
🇳🇱 Olivier Oosterbaan, partner at LMO Advocaten (Amsterdam)
🇰🇷 Brian Chung, partner at Kim & Chang (Seoul)
🇹🇷 Burak Ozdagistanli, managing partner at Özdağıstanli Ekici (Istanbul)
🇬🇧 Paul Gardner, partner at Wiggin (London)

The 4 teams that will qualify to the semifinals (and win the complimentary tickets to the Summit in Vilnius in Septembe 2023) will do so on the basis of merit and merit alone – succeeding in front of a truly international panel.

Registration open until January 10

Each year we have about 20 teams competing in the Challenge, and most years we end up with a 🇵🇱 Polish and a 🇬🇧 British team battling it out in the finals (though 2022 was a bit of an exception to this rule...). The registration for Legal Challenge remains open until January 10, 2023 – with the first teams already coming through. Please help us spread the word by sharing this link with the law schools and recent graduates: Legal Challenge 2023.

SUMMIT 2023

Top-tier partners for the Summit 2023 confirmed

Let's please have a round of applause for the top-tier partners of the next year's Summit: ADVANT, Baker McKenzie, Frankfurt Kurnit, Latham & Watkins, MSK and Osborne Clarke. Such a broad support allows us to spare no cost in arranging a safe space with a full focus on professional engagement. Thank you!

We're at 70% of registrations

In 2023, the Summit will be a bit smaller than the 2022 edition: we aim to broaden representation while also increasing the engagement, which takes a bit of tweaking. As of this writing, we have registered a bit over 175 attendees, i.e. 70% of the overall capacity (250 seats).

Would you like to attend?

All the requests for 2023 are now handled via application forms: to apply for the Summit in 🇱🇹 Vilnius, please go here and hit the link called "application form"; to apply for the Unpacked in 🇵🇱 Warsaw, pease go here.

A balancing act

While the Warsaw event is open to any qualified attendee (must be a lawyer or be in a business related to games industry), the Vilnius event is more of a balancing act as we review each application with the Summit's community board. Whenever we can, we ask law firms and games companies to split their team between Warsaw and Vilnius, so that we can have fewer people in Vilnius – while having them represent more studios and more firms.

Q&A – MSK

The first round of Q&A with the Summit's partners is here, this time in the format of short articles. We started by asking Karin Pagnanelli and Marc Mayer at MSK, co-chairs of its video game practice, about their firm and its experience with the industry: read it here.

Q&A – ADVANT

From Los Angeles, we move to Europe – home of ADVANT, an association of 3 law firms that are heavily engaged with the games industry. We touched base with Andreas Lober on the synergies of the group: read it here.

Q&A – FRANKFURT KURNIT

New York City, home to some of the most amazing sushi bars, is also the place where Sean Kane met � Greg Boyd. They liked each other so much that 10 years ago they merged their video game practices – becoming co-chairs of Frankfurt Kurnit's interactive entertainment group. We spoke to them about a few things, including their connection to the VGBA and to the Psychedelic Bar Association: read it here.

...and that's about it for today – it's good to be back in touch, and it's even better to do it at the platform that aims to be billionaire-proof!

See you soon.