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Any legal dispute relating to supplementary remuneration which the salaried
employee could receive further to his invention shall be submitted to the Civil and
Commercial Chambers of the Court of First Instance.
((b) all other inventions shall belong to the salaried employee. However, where an
invention is made by a salaried employee, either in the course of the performance of
his duties or in the company’s field of activities, or through the knowledge or
utilization of techniques or means specific to the company, or from data procured by
it, the salaried employee must immediately inform his employer thereof by means of
a written declaration sent by registered letter with acknowledgement of receipt.
The employer shall have six months as from the date of receipt of the abovementioned written declaration to be granted ownership or enjoyment of all or part of
the rights deriving from the invention of his salaried employee by filing a patent
application with the Djibouti Office of Industrial and Commercial Property.
However, where the employer has failed to file the patent application within the
aforegoing period, the invention shall revert as of right to the salaried employee.
The salaried employee must obtain a fair price therefor which, failing an agreement
between the parties, shall be fixed by the court; the court shall take into consideration
all elements which may be given to it by the employer and by the salaried employee,
to calculate the fair price based on both the initial contributions of both parties and
the industrial and commercial utility of the invention.
((c) the salaried employee and the employer must communicate to each other all
useful information on the invention in question. They shall abstain from making any
disclosure that would be liable to compromise either entirely or in part the exercise of
the rights granted under this Title.
Any agreement between the salaried employee and his employer having as its
subject an invention of the salaried employee must be recorded in writing, on pain of
invalidation.
Where there is more than one inventor, a joint declaration may be made by all the
inventors or by some of them only.
The contents of the declaration shall be determined by regulation.
Article 19
The action claiming ownership shall be statute-barred after three years following the
date on which the title is entered in the National Register of Patents referred to in
paragraph 1 of Article 58 below.
Article 20
The inventor, whether or not he is a salaried employee, shall be referred to as such
in the patent. The employer may also oppose such a reference.