Introducing TMI Associates 23rd Floor, Roppongi Hills Mori Tower 6-10-1 Roppongi, Minato-ku, Tokyo 106-6123 Japan Phone : 03 6438 5611 Fax : 03 6438 5622 http://www.tmi.gr.jp/english 1/6
Firm Overview Since its establishment on October 1, 1990, TMI Associates has rapidly grown and achieved its goal of becoming a full service law firm that can offer valuable and comprehensive legal services of the highest caliber at all times while placing great importance on exercising unparalleled legal judgment in areas including intellectual property, corporate, finance and bankruptcy laws, as well as litigation matters. Among the practice areas of TMI, intellectual property, including trademarks and patents, has been an integral part of the firm since its establishment, and our firm is able to boast an unrivaled level of experience and achievements in this area. TMI has approximately 60 patent/trademark attorneys ("Benrishi") in addition to approximately 300 attorneys-at-law ("Bengoshi"). These professionals, together with more than 50 patent/trademark paralegals, compose a unique organizational structure that enables us to respond in a highly effective and efficient manner to the needs of clients across a wide variety of businesses and technologies from all around the globe. Our Bengoshi and Benrishi work together on a routine basis, allowing our practice to focus on all aspects of intellectual property law including patent/trademark prosecution, litigation, trials before the Japan Patent Office (JPO), opinions involving infringement, freedom to operate (FTO), validity, and pre-litigation analysis, due diligence, patent term extension (PTE), and import suspension at Customs. These practices of TMI are strongly recognized and appraised, both domestically and internationally. Recent awards are as follows. Ranked Band 2 in the "Intellectual Property: Domestic Firms: Japan" section of "Chambers Asia Pacific." Ranked TIER 1 in the "Trademark Contentious/Non-Contentious" section, and TIER 2 in the "Trademark Prosecution," "Patent Prosecution" and "Patent Contentious" sections of "Managing Intellectual Property" in 2013. Recommended as "Leading Firm" in the "World's Leading Patent Practitioners" sections of "Intellectual Asset Management (iam)" in 2013. Ranked TIER 1 in the "Patent Contentious" section and TIR2 in the "Patent Prosecution" section of "Asia IP". Ranked "The World's Leading Trademark Professionals 2013" by World Trademark Review 2013. 2/6
Ranked "Leading" (top grade) in the "Japan IP: local advice" section of "PRACTICAL LAW COMPANY". Prized for "Asia IP Japan Trademark of the Year" in Asia IP Awards 2012 by Asia IP. 3/6
Member of IP Section Patent/Trademark Attorneys(Benrishi):59 Electric/ Electronic 20 Chemical/ Bio/ Pharma 15 Mechanical Engineering 10 Trademark /Design 14 IP Lawyers(Bengoshi): 30 Number of Cases Handles over 3000 patent, trademark and design applications and over 20 IP lawsuits per year Quality TMI's practices are strongly recognized and appraised, both domestically and internationally. Ranked TIER 1 in the "Patent Contentious" section and TIR2 in the "Patent Prosecution" section of "Asia IP" Ranked TIER 2 in the "Patent Contentious" and "Patent Prosecution" sections of "Managing Intellectual Property" in 2013. Ranked Band 2 in the "Intellectual Property: Domestic Firms: Japan" section of "Chambers Asia Pacific". Recommended as "Leading Firm" in the "World's Leading Patent Practitioners" sections of "Intellectual Asset Management (iam)" in 2013. Ranked "Leading" (top grade) in the "Japan IP: local advice" section of "PRACTICAL LAW COMPANY". Prosecution Domestic and Foreign Clients 50/50 Balance Patent Attorney (Benrishi) Cover all Technologies Good Docket System Reliable Paralegals 4/6
Opinion Work Experienced in Infringement and Validity Opinions including FTO and IP Validity Search / Opinions Experienced in Patent Licensing Negotiations for both offensive and defensive Handled by both Benrishi and Bengoshi Handled by teams rather than one professional Litigation Over 100 patent infringement litigations for both domestic and foreign clients within the past 10 years Handled by teams of 2-3 IP Lawyers(Bengoshi) and 2-3 Patent/Trademark Attorney (Benrishi) Supported by an IP High Court judge, a former head of the trial board of the Japan Patent Office and occasionally a former Supreme Court justice Very experienced for both foreign and domestic clients Transactions/Due Diligence Very experienced Conducted by a seamless team of Bengoshi for corporate aspects and Benrishi for IP aspects Strengths One of the largest general practice firm in Japan Intellectual Property is known to be the strongest expertise of TMI Presence of former judges and JPO trial examiners Superior work at competitive rates Complete solutions regarding the IP matters through seamless collaboration between Bengoshi and Benrishi In comparison with other general practice firms having IP capability, TMI is the only firm which can handle all types of IP matters; prosecution, litigation, transaction/due diligence for all kinds of technology. In comparison with other IP firms, TMI always handles patent/trademark matters from a business perspective. TMI attorneys handle IP prosecution with an eye towards how the claims will be interpreted at court. 5/6
Contact Information TMI Associates 23rd Floor, Roppongi Hills Mori Tower 6-10-1 Roppongi, Minato-ku, Tokyo 106-6123 Japan Tel: +81-3-6438-5611 Fax:+81-3-6438-5622 Email: all IP matters (pat_tm@tmi.gr.jp) managing partner: Yoshiyuki Inaba (yinaba@tmi.gr.jp) 6/6