Gopakumar Nair Associates

The firm: Gopakumar Nair Associates (GNAs®) is a premier intellectual property consultancy and legal advisory firm providing high-quality legal and technical solutions for companies in the biotechnology, biomedical, chemical, healthcare, pharmaceutical, and other knowledge-based industries.

Founded by Dr Gopakumar G Nair, GNAs® provides support to a wide range of companies for filing patents, domestic and internationally, as well as helping start-up companies using technology licences from universities and other research centres.

The firm also helps clients identify and seize opportunities as well as diffuse threats to their intellectual property. Though GNAs® is a 15-year old intellectual property firm, it has unrivalled ability and experience over established firms especially since it is in the right place at the right time and has grown amid the fast-changing IP/patent scenario in India.

GNAs® is a Mumbai-based IP boutique law firm specialising in patents, trade marks, designs, contracts and consultancies for corporates and R&D enterprises and academic institutes. GNAs® commenced its operations in pharma-related IP/patent activities. Thereafter, the firm became popular with chemical, electronic, herbal, automobile, engineering, environmental, agriculture, fisheries, polymer chemistry and a very broad spectrum of technical fields. Through GNA Patent Gurukul, the firm is actively engaged in IP/patent dissemination, awareness creation and proficiency creation, thereby empowering the young technopreneurs to move forward successfully.

Areas of practice: Patent non-infringement status (PNIS) and freedom to operate (FTO) certification is a priority area for GNAs® and its associate Gnanlex Hermeneutics Pvt Ltd. GNAs® is very active in patent prosecution in India directly both as domestic, convention as well as PCT international-based national phase filings. GNAs® is active in nearly 50 countries for national phase filing of patent applications through associate attorneys in respective countries. GNAs? is also filing national phase patent applications in India for overseas applications, as per instructions from its overseas associates.

A major area of GNAs®’ operation is providing workaround solutions and help in non-infringing process and product development. Corporate consultancies on a retainership basis are also undertaken by GNAs®.

Pre-grant opposition to pending patent applications, post-grant opposition to recently granted patents, revocation of older patents through IPAB (Intellectual Property Appellate Board), defending clients in infringement suits and injunction applications as well as filing counter-claim for revocation of patents are frequently undertaken by GNAs®. GNAs® also handles IP/patent enforcement and infringement suits as and when instructed by clients.

Patent prosecution, trade mark and design registrations, IP/patent litigations and PNIS (patent non-infringement status) and FTO (freedom to operate) certifications are major activities of GNAs®.