[casual_games] negotiation costs

[James Gwertzman]

I don't know where that number comes from. A top US IP lawyer will cost around $250-300/hour with good lawyers available for much less. If you're getting a contract from a major portal for the first time you're realistically not going to have a lot of leverage to ask for changes anyway so there's a limit to how much time you should spend. Also legalese may be confusing but it does make sense. You can do a lot of this yourself - you should not have your lawyer do all the work for you.

 

Carefully read the contract yourself and make sure you understand what it all means - then bring in your lawyer, have him/her review the contract, ask questions, have your lawyer put together a list of changes, then go in and present the changes yourself. Don't have your lawyer negotiate on your behalf - that's the fastest way to ring up huge legal bills.

 

My advice for negotiating a first-time deal with a portal as a small developer:

1)       start at the term sheet level. Work out the key deal mechanics on a term sheet before you move to the full contract. Ideally talk to friends already in the industry to understand the key deal "levers" so you know which ones can be adjusted and which cannot.

2)       Once you have negotiated the term sheet, then move to the full contract. Read it through yourself, make a list of areas that you think need to be changed, then go to your lawyer. Have him add his changes, then do your best negotiating those changes yourself. And again, be realistic about how much you're going to be able to change.

 

If you're really careful you should be able to negotiate a contract with 2-10 hours of legal time - which is more like $500-2000. Less once you've got your first few contracts behind you and you can start to see patterns across contracts. 

--------------------
James Gwertzman
Director of Business Development
PopCap Games
+1-206-256-4210 

________________________________

From: casual_games-bounces at igda.org [mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Ryan Sumo
Sent: Thursday, April 06, 2006 10:30 PM
To: casual_games at igda.org
Subject: [casual_games] negotiation costs

 

Hi guys,
   
  In a workshop from the europe casuality.org conference, I noticed it 
said something about:
   
  1) contracts costing between 2-5k to negotiate a contract with a 
distributor
  2) needing a good commercial IP lawyer
   
  I was wondering if anyone could tell me why exactly it costs between 
2-5k to negotiate a contract (I'm asssuming the lawyer's fees make up 
some of this?)?
   
  Also, since I'm based in the Philippines, would I have to hire an US 
based IP lawyer when dealing with distributors/publishers in the 
States?
   
  Hope you can help me out! 
   
  Ryan Sumo 

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