The Olympic Movement, the Games and Olympic IPR

By Kelly C. Crabb and Xiang Ji, Morrison & Foerster LLP, Century City and Beijing

The Olympic Games have become the world's most well known and widely viewed athletic competition. Prepared, organized and staged by numerous international and local non-profit organizations that comprise the Olympic Movement, the organizers of the Olympics throughout the world are committed to promoting Olympic ideals and ensuring that as many people as possible have the opportunity to participate in and benefit from the Olympic competitions. Ensuring this broad participation and availability globally has required significant financial resources, which many years ago exceeded the capacity of most national governments to provide. From an early date, therefore, the Olympic Movement sought different sources of funding to support the Games, including leveraging the Games' intellectual property rights - the Olympic IPR.

Here we will take an overview of the organizational structure of the Olympic Movement, the allocation of responsibilities for the organization and staging of the Games, and the importance of Olympic IPR in achieving the goals of the Olympic Movement.