Ryan C. C. Duckett

My focus

I help entertainment and media businesses, major corporations and high-net-worth individuals, such as musical artists, producers, cutting-edge creatives, entrepreneurs and technology innovators, with strategic planning, trade secrets and other intellectual property protection, innovative growth techniques, risk management and market control. My engineering background helps me understand my clients’ passion for innovation and their commitment to protecting their work.

Commercial Disputes

My practice primarily focuses on complex commercial disputes representing clients across a broad spectrum of industries in all phases of litigation. A significant part of my practice focuses on intellectual property ownership rights and entertainment disputes, such as protecting and defending trade secrets, copyrights, trademarks and patents. I am well versed on structuring protective covenants to best protect both the companies’ and the creators’ interests. I litigate a variety of cases from breach of licensing or distribution agreements, to unfair business practices and shareholder derivative suits. I also find myself representing claimants and counter-claimants on a variety of patent, trademark and copyright litigation disputes. I supervise and participate in every phase of a matter from advising, demands and pre-litigation disputes, to law and motion, discovery, trials, arbitrations and mediation, as well as post-trial motions and appeals.

Entertainment and Technology

I concentrate much of my time on legal developments in the entertainment industry and helping major corporations and high-profile artists prosecute or defend against patent, copyright and trademark infringement, while globalizing their marks and strengthening their brands. I also advise small- to medium-size companies on how to compete in the larger markets.

I work closely with various technology companies in the virtual-reality and 360-video space, providing counsel to advance these technologies’ future application in entertainment events, such as sports and concerts, and their use in furthering education, as well as their implementation in health care. Since 2018, I sit on the board for various worldwide virtual reality and augmented reality organizations.

Outside Counsel

Clients facing a crisis need results fast, while keeping their privacy and proprietary information confidential. I provide guidance and develop strategic legal solutions, drawing on the experience and talent of 600+ NP colleagues. If I can’t answer your question, I know the NP attorney who can.

Looking ahead

A close watch on evolving legal issues and trends affecting the entertainment, aerospace, medical, and educational industries is more important than ever as entities in those industries look to achieve goals and protect work.

• “Legal Ethics and the Attorney-Client Privilege,” Nixon Peabody Annual MCLE Seminar, San Francisco, January 2019

Representative experience

• Danny Wimmer Presents, LLC. v. Davis Shapiro Lewit Grabel Leven Granderson & Blake LLP (September 2017)—Supervised the trial team for an intense three-week trial concerning breach of fiduciary duties and pecuniary claims against one of the biggest international concert promotion companies brought by its former attorneys claiming a multimillion-dollar partnership interest