Von Seidels is a specialist IP law firm in Africa with a team of over 100 people. We assist clients both locally and internationally in obtaining all forms of IP protection and deals with all IP related commercial activities, including agreements, valuations and litigation.
Our head office is in Cape Town and we have a satellite office in Johannesburg, South Africa. We have offices in ARIPO (Namibia), OAPI (Cameroon) and Nigeria.
Von Seidels OAPI office is based in Yaoundé, Cameroon and is managed by Oswald Alembong who resides in Yaoundé.
Oswald Alembong, a qualified chemical engineer, worked in our head office in Cape Town, South Africa for five years and qualified as a South African attorney and patent attorney. He returned to his home country of Cameroon in January 2020 and established our OAPI office. In addition to being a South African patent attorney, Oswald is also a qualified Cameroonian attorney.
Our OAPI office provides IP services in 17 African countries. OAPI (Organisation Africaine de la Propriété Intellectuelle) is a regional filing system for patents and trade marks providing protection in all its 17 member countries which are predominantly French-speaking: Benin, Burkina-Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Senegal, Togo and Comoros.
Our offices cover the majority of the African continent. South Africa, ARIPO, OAPI and Nigeria combined comprise 70% of Africa’s countries. In the rest of Africa we work with trusted agents.
With many years of experience working in Africa, we have vast local knowledge and understanding of country-specific legislative requirements and issues across this continent.
