Penelope Catley | Principal

Penny Catley has over 30 years’ experience as a commercial intellectual property lawyer, advising on trade marks, copyright, trade secrets and related commercial agreements.

Expertise

Penny is a commercial intellectual property lawyer in Australia and New Zealand. She has practised for more than 30 years and is a registered patent attorney in both countries.

Penny enjoys interacting with her local and international clients and getting to know their business issues. She is passionate about maximising the value of her clients’ intangible assets.

Penny has worked for clients in a number of industries, including dairy, food and beverage, wine, education, fashion, energy and FMCG among others. She currently acts for successful local companies Z Energy, as well as international companies Harley-Davidson and Novartis, and Australian fashion designer Collette Dinnigan.

Experience

Penny is a past President of the New Zealand Institute of Patent Attorneys (NZIPA). Before joining Baldwins (now AJ Park), Penny worked for 11 years (four of those as a partner) at full-service law firm Kensington Swan, where she headed up the intellectual property team. Penny started her career at AJ Park.

Recent accolades

Penny’s recent industry accolades include being:

ranked as a trade mark star in New Zealand in Managing IP's IP Stars 2021
named by Managing IP as one of the Top 250 Women in IP 2020
highlighted in World Trademark Review’s WTR 1000 2021 for prosecution and strategy and acknowledged for her ‘astute commercial insights and wealth of experience to the team’
named in The Legal 500’s Asia-Pacific 2021 guide and elite ‘leading lawyers’ list
named a global leader for trade marks by Who’s Who Legal 2020.
named a national and global leader for trade marks in the 2021 edition of Who's Who Legal
recognised as a Trade Mark star in Managing IP's 2021 IP Stars
named in the 2021 list of World Intellectual Property Review Leaders
named in The Legal 500’s Asia-Pacific 2022 guide and elite ‘leading lawyers’ list
highlighted in WTR 1000 2022 as a highly recommended individual
selected by her peers for inclusion in the 2023 Best Lawyers in New Zealand ™ in the field of IP law.

Beyond work

Penny loves fashion and design and recently completed a beach house renovation project. She enjoys a “big, rich and buttery” Californian chardonnay and the network of colleagues and friends she has established around the world as a result of practising in this field of the law.

Services

Expertise

Qualifications

LLB, Victoria University of Wellington (1989)
Admitted as a Barrister & Solicitor of the High Court of New Zealand
Registered Patent Attorney (New Zealand and Australia)
Registered Trade Marks Attorney (Australia)

Velettà \ The beauty of being in business

Wellington woman Sarah Bacon traded her career as an entertainment lawyer to pursue a lifelong passion—creating her own luxury brand of natural skincare.

The beauty of being in business

Penelope Catley 's insights

Article \ 22 Nov 2021

Trade marks and the metaverse

Recently, Mark Zuckerberg revealed a new, ambitious vision for Facebook. The trillion-dollar social media company would transition to ’a metaverse company’ named ‘Meta’. This move indicates that the metaverse is something to keep an eye on, and it will perhaps play a dominant role in our future. Some are even claiming it is the next version of the internet. However, we will need to wait and see if it reaches these heights.

Client story \ 31 May 2019

Harley-Davidson - a brand with worldwide appeal

Harley-Davidson is one of the most successful and famous motorcycle brands in the world. In Australia and New Zealand, we administer Harley-Davidson’s brands and customs notices, in addition to actively enforcing the company’s intellectual property rights. We also works closely with customs officials to combat the importation of any counterfeit Harley-Davidson products.

Article \ 10 Jan 2017

Battle of the Masters: MasterCard defeated by the World Masters…

AJ Park's Partner, Penny Catley and Senior Associate, Deborah Kessell-Haak summarise a recent trade mark battle in New Zealand between MasterCard International Incorporated the World Masters Games. This article was originally published in the World Trademark Review.

Article \ 29 Nov 2013

A close shave with the Advertising Standards Authority: Knowing your…

We can all accept that social media has established itself as one of the most powerful marketing tools a brand can employ. In terms of advertising potential the consumer pool runs deep: during September 2013 Facebook logged on average 727 million daily active users. This brought the total of monthly active users to 1.19 billion.* Brands must, therefore, be aware of what content constitutes ‘advertising’ under New Zealand law and appreciate the way in which methods of attracting consumers are regulated.

Article \ 18 Oct 2013

A U.S. copyright small claims court?

In 2011, the United States Congress requested that the national Copyright Office report on the challenges facing copyright owners in resolving small copyright claim disputes through the current federal system.

See all insights