NYSE moves closer to NFT trading with trademark application

The New York Stock Exchange has filed an application to register the term "NYSE" for a marketplace for non-fungible tokens (NFTs), taking a step closer to setting up an online trading place for cryptocurrencies and NFTs.

The hype around cryptocurrencies last year spilled over to NFTs, a form of speculative investment that has attracted fans including former US first lady Melania Trump and Jamaican sprint great Usain Bolt.

Companies involved in this sector have also been backed by heavyweights Microsoft Corp and SoftBank Group Corp .

If the NYSE launches a new marketplace, it would compete with SuperRare, Rarible and NFT markeplace giant OpenSea, which was valued at $13.3 billion after its latest funding round.

However, a spokesperson for the NYSE said it has no immediate plans to launch cryptocurrency or NFT trading.

"(The NYSE) regularly considers new products and their impact on our trademarks and protects our intellectual property rights accordingly," the spokesperson added.

NFTs have left many baffled as to why so much money is spent on items that do not physically exist. Some also believe the industry is saturated by scammers and too often rewards viral art of low quality.

The NYSE minted its first set of NFTs in April last year, commemorating the first trades of six "notable" listings. 

The exchange's filing indicates it could enter into the metaverse too, as it seeks to provide "virtual reality, augmented reality and mixed reality software".

Metaverse refers to shared, immersive digital environments which can be accessed via virtual reality or augmented reality headsets or computer screens.

Besides NFTs, the exchange would also provide "an online marketplace for buyers, sellers and traders of virtual and digital assets, artwork", it said in a filing with the US Patent and Trademark Office dated Feb. 10.

-reuters-

Sports Illustrated, the brand, is sold for $110 million

The intellectual property of Sports Illustrated, the magazine whose monumental covers and narrative voices have helped define American sports since its debut 65 years ago, has been sold for $110 million to Authentic Brands Group, in an unusual transaction that suggests the magazine’s most coveted asset is its brand.

The previous owner, Meredith, and the buyer, Authentic Brands Group, announced the completed sale Monday night. Under its terms, Meredith will continue to run Sports Illustrated’s biweekly magazine and website, paying Authentic Brands an undisclosed licensing fee for at least two years.

What Authentic Brands immediately bought was not the magazine itself but rather Sports Illustrated’s valuable intellectual property. The purchase covers the magazine’s trove of more than 2 million images, its swimsuit and Sportsperson of the Year brands, the instantly recognizable name itself and other assets.

A news release indicated that Authentic Brands, a licensing company that owns the brands of celebrities like Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley and clothing retailers such as Juicy Couture, will make money off these properties through live events, e-sports and sports gambling, among other things.

The companies billed the deal as a “strategic partnership.”

“As a trailblazer and cultural phenomenon, Sports Illustrated has created moments and experiences for its readers that are unmatched by any other sports brand,” Nick Woodhouse, president and chief marketing officer of Authentic Brands, said in a statement. “We look forward to working with Meredith to extend Sports Illustrated’s legacy and connect the brand with new audiences around the world.”

Sports Illustrated’s editor-in-chief, Chris Stone, emphasized in a statement that Authentic Brands and Meredith were committed to continuing to support the magazine and website editorially. (FanSided, a sports-focused network of websites owned by Meredith, was not part of the deal, and Meredith is “currently in the process of selling” it, the statement said.)

“This deal only made sense if we continue to generate premium journalism and storytelling,” Stone said in a memo to staff.

Meredith had acquired Sports Illustrated when it bought Time Inc. for $2.8 billion last year.

For decades the titan of sports journalism, Sports Illustrated struggled in recent years to meet the imperatives of the web and deal with the downsides of ink and paper. Meredith, based in Des Moines, Iowa, told employees more than year ago that it was likely to sell Sports Illustrated along with Time, Fortune and Money, while holding on to lifestyle publications like Allrecipes and Better Homes and Gardens.

Time was sold to Marc Benioff, the chief executive of the software company Salesforce, and Fortune to Chatchaval Jiaravanon, whose family controls one of Thailand’s largest companies. Meredith has announced that it is ending Money’s print edition.


2019 New York Times News Service

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Huawei leads Asian domination of UN patent applications in 2018

GENEVA -- Chinese telecoms giant Huawei led the pack with Asia accounting for more than half of the international patent applications at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) last year, WIPO said on Tuesday.

Huawei, which has been under pressure since the United States demanded its allies bar Chinese vendors from participating in building 5G networks due to national security concerns, made 5,405 patent applications to the UN body, up from 4,024 in 2017.

"It’s an all-time record by anyone," WIPO director general Francis Gurry told a news conference.

WIPO oversees international treaties governing patents, trademarks and industrial designs. Its annual report on the applications it receives - a subset of all intellectual property filings globally - gives an early snapshot of the trends.

Asia-based filings accounted for 50.5 percent of the total applications received, Gurry said.

"Historically, this is really quite extraordinary," he said. "Historically, this is a momentous occasion, this is something that is really a very, very significant result."

The second-biggest user of the WIPO international patent system in 2018 was Mitsubishi Electric with 2,812 filings, followed by Intel with 2,499.

Although inventors in the United States filed more applications than in any other country, China looks set to take the top place this year or next, after a meteoric rise over the past quarter century.

Having filed only one patent application in the WIPO system in 1993, its applications overtook Japan's in 2017 and grew by a further 9.1 percent to 53,345 in 2018, while the number of US-based filings slipped 0.9 percent to 56,142.

Asia accounted for six of the top eight companies, with China's ZTE Corp and BOE Technology Group and South Korea's Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics also among the leaders.

China also jumped up the academic rankings, with four of its universities making the top ten list for the first time.

While the University of California remained well ahead among educational institutions, with 501 patent applications in 2018, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology was second, Shenzhen University and South China University of Technology leapt into third and fourth spot, just ahead of Harvard.

Gurry said Chinese universities benefited from an extremely strong emphasis on innovation and the commercialization of basic research, as well as access to the world's second largest national pool of research and development spending.

He said China had introduced an equivalent of the US Bayh-Dole Act, ensuring that patents taken out on government-sponsored research were being used, which may have had an influence on Chinese universities' attitude towards commercializing their research.

The WIPO report represents applications for patents, trademarks and designs that their owners feel are valuable enough to protect and promote in overseas markets. Another WIPO report, released in December includes millions of applications for IP protection that are never filed overseas.

source: news.abs-cbn.com