The Norwegian Transparency Act
Sustainable business operations
Oppdatert juni 2024
Our vision
We will be the first choice for value-creating and smart IP consultancy services.
We offer value-creating, high-quality IP services by adopting a strategic, commercial and proactive approach.
We provide our clients and partners with the best client journey on the market.
This confers a significant responsibility, which in turn makes major demands of ourselves, our service providers and agents.
Sustainable business operations cover a large and diverse area. We believe that the winners of the future will be those who deliver value-creating services in a way that combines global social and environmental responsibility with profitable operations.
Our ethical foundation
A shared platform based on our Code of Conduct helps us build the culture we want to characterise Bryn Aarflot (link to “Ethical Statement and Code of Conduct”).
The principles in our Code of Conduct express what our employees, vendors, business partners and clients can expect from Bryn Aarflot.
In addition, our advisors and our business practices are subject to stringent guiding principles and requirements, through membership of and participation in professional and industry-focused organisations such as the Norwegian Bar Association, the Association of Norwegian Intellectual Property Attorneys (FONIP), the International Federation of Intellectual Property Attorneys (FICPI) and the International Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property (AIPPI).
Vendors and business partners
Vendors: Bryn Aarflot engages selected Norwegian vendors to conduct our business. Our largest and most business-critical areas are property (premises), IT (operations, systems and equipment), banking, insurance, pensions, auditing and marketing.
In selecting and following up our vendors, we emphasise that they must conduct their business without compromising fundamental human rights and decent working conditions.
Business partners: In order to be able to carry out international engagements for our clients, we employ a wide network of local agents and representatives across the world. These carry out local engagements in their jurisdiction on behalf of our clients, based on our instructions.
In the same way as us, our foreign partners are legal and/or consultancy firms, made up of highly qualified advisors – mainly lawyers, technical experts and support personnel.
Wherever possible, we engage agents who are also members of FICPI and are therefore subject to the same guidelines as us:
FICPI Code of Conduct: STATUTS – REGLEMENTS – CODE DE CONDUITESTATUTES – RULES – CODE OF CONDUCTSTATUTEN – GESCHÄFTSORDNUNG – STANDESREGELN (ficpi.org)
The Norwegian Transparency Act
The Norwegian Transparency Act entered into force on 1 July 2022. The Act aims to promote respect for fundamental human rights and decent working conditions among businesses. This applies to businesses’ own operations, our vendors’ service providers and value chains and other business partners.
The law requires:
- Due diligence to understand the risk of the business causing, or being complicit in, violations of human rights or not providing decent working conditions and to introduce any necessary measures to stop, prevent or mitigate risk
- Readily available reporting on the website
- Obligation to provide information on request
This means that in future everyone at Bryn Aarflot will be even more aware of and transparent about how our activities affect the world around us.
Due diligence
Our aim is to ensure that both our own business, and our vendors and business partners/agents, conduct their operations without compromising fundamental human rights and decent working conditions.
We use the OECD’s Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Business Conduct as our starting point. We have also drawn up a Code of Conduct (link) as a foundation for all our relationships with our vendors/business partners.
We carry out due diligence in connection with various business decisions, for example, when establishing new business areas, launching new products/services or acquiring other businesses. We adopt a risk-based approach, and risk assessments and analyses are an integral part of our working methods. In addition, due diligence must be performed prior to business decisions in order to comply with various laws and regulations.
Bryn Aarflot also carries out due diligence in relation to the environment and anti-corruption.
We use reliable and reputable sources to assess risk. These sources quantify the degree of risk in order to ensure that we assess risk as objectively as possible. Such sources include Freedom House, the International Trade Union Confederation, the Environmental Performance Index and Transparency International. In addition, we refer to the Norwegian Agency for Public and Financial Management’s high-risk list when assessing Norwegian suppliers.
Our Code of Conduct is the basis of all relationships with vendors and business partners/agents. The Code of Conduct is published on our website and is also always attached when we communicate with external parties.
Organisation
Responsibility for carrying out due diligence and following up our Code of Conduct is allocated as follows:
Management has overarching responsibility for ensuring all guidelines are followed.
Administration is responsible for product and operational services vendors.
The heads of the Patent and Legal departments are responsible for the various business partners/foreign agents they engage to carry out our client engagements.
Experiences so far
In spring 2024 we surveyed our Norwegian vendors and foreign business partners on compliance with the content of the Transparency Act, and achieved a response rate of over 70 per cent. All responses were positive in relation to our requirements.