Privacy Policy
The operators of these pages take the protection of your personal data very seriously. We treat your personal data confidentially, in accordance with statutory data protection regulations and this privacy policy.
This privacy policy describes which of your data we collect and for which purposes we process it in the course of our work at our firm. It also contains further important information on the protection of your data, in particular which statutory rights you have concerning your data.
1. Name and contact details of the person responsible for the processing of data and the company data protection officer
This data protection information applies to data processing by:
Information pursuant to Section 5 of the German Telemedia Act (TMG):
HKW Intellectual Property PartG mbB
Theresienhöhe 12
80339 München
Contact:
Phone: +49 89 5794929‑0
Fax: +49 89 5794929‑29
Email: mail@hkw-ip.eu
Website: www.hkw-ip.eu
Represented by:
Friedemann Horn
Tobias Kleimann
Frank Waitzhofer
Michael Schmid Dreyer
VAT identification number pursuant to Section 27a UStG: DE 278001591
The company data protection officer of HKW Intellectual Property PartG mbB can be reached at the above address or at datenschutz@hkw-ip.eu.
2. Processing of personal data and purpose of use
Data processing when you access the website
When you visit our website at www.hkw-ip.eu, information is automatically transmitted by the browser on your device to the server of our website. This information is temporarily stored in a so-called log file. The following information is collected without any action on your part and stored until it is automatically deleted:
• IP address of the requesting computer
• Date and time of access
• Name and URL of the file accessed
• Website from which the access is made (referrer URL)
• Browser used and, if applicable, the operating system of your computer, as well as the name of your access provider
We will not pass these data on to third parties without your explicit consent. We process the data for the following purposes:
• Ensuring a smooth connection to the website
• Ensuring a comfortable use of our website
• Evaluating the security and stability of the system
• For further administrative purposes
The legal basis for the processing is Article 6(1) sentence 1 lit. f GDPR. Our legitimate interest follows from the purposes listed above for data collection. Under no circumstances will we use the collected data to draw conclusions about your identity.
Furthermore, we use cookies and analysis services when you visit our website. You can find detailed explanations under sections 5 and 6 of this privacy policy.
Processing of data transmitted via contact, including applicant data, and data processing in the context of an attorney-client relationship
Subject to data processing by us are your contact details as well as any additional personal data required for our service provision or communication with you, including, in particular:
• Salutation, first name, surname
• Valid email address
• Postal address
• Telephone number (landline and/or mobile)
• Further information and documents that you provide to us in connection with your matter (e.g. job application)
• Information necessary for the registration of intellectual property rights with domestic and foreign authorities, as well as for the assertion and defense of your intellectual property or other rights during the engagement
If you have not provided us with your personal data yourself, we may have received it from our clients or business partners or from publicly accessible sources.
The purposes of the data processing are:
• To identify you
• For correspondence with you, authorities and courts
• To provide you with appropriate legal advice and representation
• If applicable, for our decision regarding establishment of an employment relationship with you
• For concluding or executing engagement agreements, orders, contracts, or for creating or responding to proposals and defining the terms of the contractual relationship with our clients, business partners, service providers, or cooperation partners for whom you may act as a representative or employee
• For the registration of intellectual property rights with domestic and foreign authorities and for the assertion and defense of your rights or other rights under the engagement
• For handling any liability claims and for asserting any claims against you
• For internal administrative purposes (e.g. accounting and invoicing)
• To send you our client information, such as firm events, to the extent relevant to your business
• To ensure IT security and operation of our firm
• For the use of service providers (e.g. external IT service providers) who support our business processes
Legal basis:
In the event of contact initiated by you or if you voluntarily provide us with your personal data in other cases (e.g. by handing over a business card or sending data by post or email), the processing is carried out pursuant to Article 6(1)(f) GDPR on the basis of our legitimate interest in the efficient administration of data of our business contacts and in ensuring the data protection-compliant use of such data.
In the case of a job application, we are authorized to process data pursuant to Article 88 GDPR in conjunction with Section 26(1) sentence 1 of the German Federal Data Protection Act (BDSG).
In the context of the attorney-client relationship, the processing is necessary for the appropriate handling of the engagement and for the mutual performance of obligations under the engagement agreement, pursuant to Article 6(1)(b) GDPR.
Part of the processing is also required by law pursuant to Article 6(1)(c) GDPR. According to Section 44 PAO and Section 50 BRAO, we are under professional law obligations to maintain attorney files and may use electronic data processing for this purpose.
We may furthermore be required to retain data longer than stated above due to tax and commercial retention and documentation obligations under the German Commercial Code (HGB), Criminal Code (StGB), or Tax Code (AO).
3. Confidentiality and deletion of your personal data
Each of our employees and all employees of external service providers who have access to personal data are obliged to treat this data confidentially. Contractors also process personal data only in accordance with our instructions.
Even after the termination of the engagement, order or contractual relationship or our contact, we may continue to process your personal data as long as you have not requested deletion and this is necessary for the aforementioned purposes, for fulfilling post-contractual obligations or for complying with legal retention obligations or for safeguarding our legitimate interests. Thereafter, your personal data will be deleted.
The personal data collected by us in connection with the engagement will be stored until the expiration of the legal retention period for attorneys (6 years after the end of the calendar year in which the engagement ended) and will then be deleted, unless we are obligated to a longer retention period under Article 6(1)(c) GDPR due to tax and commercial retention and documentation obligations (HGB, StGB, AO) or unless you have consented to a further retention period under Article 6(1)(a) GDPR.
4. Disclosure of data
No transmission of your personal data to third parties takes place for purposes other than those listed below.
We only disclose your personal data to third parties if:
• You have given your express consent pursuant to Article 6(1)(a) GDPR.
• Disclosure is permitted by law and necessary for the execution of contractual relationships with you pursuant to Article 6(1)(b) GDPR; this includes disclosure to opposing parties and their representatives (in particular their patent attorneys and lawyers) as well as courts and other public authorities for the purpose of correspondence and for registration, enforcement and defense of your (intellectual property) rights. The disclosed data may only be used by the third party for the purposes stated.
• There is a legal obligation to disclose pursuant to Article 6(1)(c) GDPR.
• Disclosure is necessary for the purposes set out above pursuant to Article 6(1)(f) GDPR and there is no reason to assume you have an overriding legitimate interest in non-disclosure.
The attorney-client privilege remains unaffected. Where data subject to attorney-client privilege is concerned, disclosure to third parties only occurs in consultation with you.
5. Right to object
If your personal data is processed on the basis of legitimate interests pursuant to Article 6(1)(f) GDPR, you have the right pursuant to Article 21 GDPR to object to the processing of your personal data for reasons arising from your particular situation or if the objection is directed against direct advertising. In the latter case, you have a general right of objection which we will implement without you having to specify a particular situation.
If you wish to exercise your right of revocation or objection, it is sufficient to send an email to datenschutz@hkw-ip.eu.
6. Data security
For security reasons and to protect the transmission of confidential content that you send to us as the site operator, our website uses SSL or TLS encryption. Thus, data that you transmit via this website is not readable by third parties. You can recognize an encrypted connection by the "https://" address line in the browser and by the lock symbol in the browser line.
7. Currency and amendment of this privacy policy
This privacy policy is currently valid and has the status as of May 2025.
