Security Rights in Intellectual Property in Belgium

Abstract

This chapter provides an overview of security rights in intellectual property and some related topics under Belgian law; as it was written as a national report for the Congress of the International Academy of Comparative Law, it tries to deal with the subtopics that were identified by the General Reporter (Eva-Maria Kieninger). In Sect. 1, we give a very short overview of the assets within the scope of the contribution (i.e. the intellectual property rights recognized in Belgian law) and, where relevant, the system of publicity (i.e. registration) for such rights. In Sect. 2, we discuss the proprietary security rights in IP and in associated assets (i.e. royalties) that are recognized in Belgian law, as well as how they are created and perfected; we also add security rights in related assets, namely royalties. In Sect. 3, we discuss the rules governing conflicting rights in the same asset (i.e. priorities), in Sect. 4 we look at the rights of the parties (irrespective of a default) in relation to the secured debt. Finally, in Sect. 5, we discuss the enforcement of security rights in IP.