Intellectual Property Attorney for Michigan Businesses
An intellectual property attorney helps you find what your business owns, lock it down, and stop other people from using it. Noffke Law works with Michigan companies on brand names, creative work, trade secrets, and who owns what under your contracts. That last one is where most companies find a hole.
What an Intellectual Property Attorney Inventories First
Most companies own more than they realize and have locked down less than they assume. Your name and logo. Your website and marketing copy. Your code. Your designs. Your customer list and pricing. Even how you do the work. Start with a simple list. What exists, who made it, and whether the company holds the rights on paper.
Trademarks, Copyrights, Trade Secrets, and Patents
A trademark covers the name and logo people know you by. Copyright covers original work, including code, the moment you create it. Trade secrets cover valuable information you actually keep quiet. Patents cover inventions and have to be registered. As your intellectual property attorney we advise on patent strategy and bring in registered patent counsel to file.
The Ownership Gap in Contractor Agreements
This is one of the most common and costly gaps we run into. You hire a developer or an agency, pay every invoice, and assume you own what they built. Without a signed handover, they often still do. It surfaces years later, when a buyer asks to see the paper trail and there is not one.
Protecting Trade Secrets Before There Is a Problem
A trade secret only counts if you took real steps to keep it secret. That means NDAs that fit the situation, limits on who can see what, confidentiality terms for staff and contractors, and an exit process that actually gets company data back. Skip those steps and it is just information.
Enforcement When Someone Copies You
The response should fit the harm. Sometimes a letter ends it. Online copying often comes down through a platform takedown. A conflicting brand name can be challenged at the trademark office. Court is the last option, not the first, and we bring in specialists when a case belongs there.
Where to Start If You Have Done None of This
Start small. Register the name you trade under. Get a signed handover from every contractor who built something for you. Put confidentiality terms in your staff paperwork. That short list closes most of the gaps an intellectual property attorney turns up during a sale.
Turning IP Into Revenue
Once ownership is clean, you can license it. Licensing is a way to earn from something you have already built without selling it. Our technology licensing page covers how those deals get structured and priced.
Frequently Asked Questions
An intellectual property attorney helps you work out what you own, secure it through registration and contracts, license it, and act when someone copies it. A lot of the job is contracts, making sure the company really holds rights to what it paid to create.
Often not, unless they signed it over in writing. Under copyright law the person who made it usually owns it. Paying the invoice does not move ownership by itself. A written handover in the contractor agreement is what makes the company the owner.
Using a name in business gives you some rights already. Registering gives you far more: priority across the country, public notice, and a much stronger hand if you have to enforce it. If you plan to grow past one local market, it is usually worth doing.
A trademark protects your name and logo. A copyright protects original work like writing, design, and code. A patent protects an invention. Plenty of businesses hold all three, each covering something different.
You generally cannot protect the idea itself. You can protect how you express it, the brand around it, and the details you keep private. In practice that means NDAs before you share, good secrecy habits, a registered name, and contracts that hand you what others build.
Ready to Work Together?
Let's discuss how Noffke Law can become a trusted extension of your team with strategic, practical legal counsel that protects value and drives growth.