The digital transformation is disrupting many traditional businesses including the brick and mortar retailers. E-commerce is changing the shopping experience and challenging the historical sales models. In turn, this landscape presents lenders with debtors owning more intangible than tangible property – in some cases, the value of the intangible surpasses that of the tangible property.
How does a lender financing an e-commerce business navigate in this market reality? I attempt to provide some guidance through my recent article (co-authored with Élisabeth Bigras) on intellectual property secured lending (« Les développements récents en droit de la propriété intellectuelle et en droit du divertissement 2019 ») published with Les Éditions Yvon Blais (Québec). It is available for purchase here.
The article explores the legal intricacies and challenges of lending and taking security on intellectual property through a fictitious case study of an online e-commerce clothing design retailer… which may be “fictitious”, but very real in light of the transformation the retail industry is currently facing.
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