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A Business Asset that Grows in Value on its Own: How to Perfectly Protect Your Character
Like Kakao Friends’ Ryan, a single well-made character has more power than dozens of advertisements. A character is not just a cute drawing; it is a ‘moving business entity’ that communicates directly with customers, grows on its own, and creates infinite added value.
Why is legal protection for characters the top priority? The moment a character’s popularity rises, it becomes the primary target of rights infringement, such as illegal merchandise and unauthorized emoticons. If the character’s appearance is not clearly protected by a design right, the brand’s freshness and value will be diluted by a flood of similar characters, leading to the loss of immense business opportunities. Character protection is the legal foundation for all derivative businesses, including licensing and merchandising.
LEPLUS’s Professional Services
• Building a Multi-faceted Rights Portfolio: We don’t stick to a single strategy. We analyze all elements constituting the character IP and build the strongest, most airtight double or triple protection network: the character’s appearance as a ‘design right’, its name as a ‘trademark’, and its unique world and story as a ‘copyright’.
• Comprehensive Protection for Various Applications: We actively use the ‘related design’ system to three-dimensionally expand the scope of rights to include not only the basic form of the character but also various expressions, applied movements, and forms wearing specific costumes. This is an effective strategy to prevent rights infringement through clever modifications.
• Consulting on Derivative Works and Licensing Agreements: We support stable business development by preemptively reviewing potential legal issues that may arise when creating derivative works such as webtoons and merchandise using the character, as well as toxic clauses that must be considered when signing licensing agreements.
