Customer Ownership Dispute

[bisjoe]

What is the name of your state? Washington

For the last year or so I have been manufacturing some items for a customer. The company is owned by two people (no employees) who are currently in a dispute that may lead to court, with a buyout or something resulting from a disagreement between them. One partner (a)owns the patents on the items I make, however the other (b)did the artwork files I use to make them. Partner (a) continues to order and operate (re-sell those items.) I just rec'd an e-mail from (b) informing me that the artwork does not belong to the company but is hers personally. Normally artwork such as this done while paid by an employer is the property of the employer, but in this case since they are partners, and shared the profits, does that also apply? I am not aware of their "tax status"
or what contracts, if any were drawn up about their partnership.

I hate to get mixed up in this and end up in court, especially since they are about 2,000 miles from here, but I also hate to lose the work. Any suggestions?

 

[divgradcurl]

What is the name of your state? Washington

For the last year or so I have been manufacturing some items for a customer. The company is owned by two people (no employees) who are currently in a dispute that may lead to court, with a buyout or something resulting from a disagreement between them. One partner (a)owns the patents on the items I make, however the other (b)did the artwork files I use to make them. Partner (a) continues to order and operate (re-sell those items.) I just rec'd an e-mail from (b) informing me that the artwork does not belong to the company but is hers personally. Normally artwork such as this done while paid by an employer is the property of the employer, but in this case since they are partners, and shared the profits, does that also apply? I am not aware of their "tax status"
or what contracts, if any were drawn up about their partnership.

I hate to get mixed up in this and end up in court, especially since they are about 2,000 miles from here, but I also hate to lose the work. Any suggestions?

Who owns the artwork is entirely dependent on what contracts and agreements exist between the two partners. If you want to keep doing work for the partner that owns the patent, perhaps having that partner draw up new artwork would resolve the issue.

 

[bisjoe]

Who owns the artwork is entirely dependent on what contracts and agreements exist between the two partners. If you want to keep doing work for the partner that owns the patent, perhaps having that partner draw up new artwork would resolve the issue.

Thanks for your comments.

The artwork for the 20+ items lived on the one person's (b) computer so I sent the versions that I have here for the actual manufacturing, that I have modifed to the person (a) I am still working with. Not only have I modified them but they are now in a completely different format from what party (b) sent me originally. She (a) is going to as you suggest re-do it and send it back to me. Apparently the artwork is owned by the corporation, which is both of them equally, but since it's on the disputing party's (b) computer she wouldn't give it up. She asked me not to send the other person (a) the artwork that she sent me but I feel I followed her wishes by sending my version instead. I'm sure she wouldn't agree with that if she found out though.

Meanwhile party (a) personally does own the patents and in fact did the designs herself initially, on paper. Party (b) did nothing more than convert it to electronic files which they could have paid someone (like me) to do.

Hopefully one will buy out the other soon so I don't remain in the middle.