Recovering royalty arrears across borders begins with the licence, not with the invoice. A publisher, a distributor or a manufacturer stops paying what a contract says it owes for the use of intellectual property, and the licensor is left chasing a partner who reports sales in one country and banks the proceeds in another.
Royalty disputes arise in publishing, franchising, software licensing, media distribution and manufacturing under trademark or patent licences. The pattern repeats: a licensee keeps exploiting the right, keeps selling, keeps streaming or manufacturing, but the statements stop matching the payments. Sometimes the licensee under-reports units sold. Sometimes it stops reporting entirely.
The claim is rarely a single missed payment. It is usually a series of shortfalls that accumulate quietly across several reporting periods before the licensor notices the gap between what the market shows and what the statements admit.
Currency conversion adds friction. A royalty calculated in the licensee's local currency and paid in the licensor's currency creates room for disagreement about the exchange rate applied on each statement, on top of any dispute about the underlying sales figures.
The licence agreement itself is the starting point: the royalty formula, the reporting obligation, the audit clause, and the dispute resolution clause. Without a written formula, a claim is an argument about intent rather than a claim about breach.
The audit clause matters more than clients expect. A licensor who has never exercised its contractual right to audit the licensee's books faces a harder claim than one who has independent figures to set against the statements. We assess whether that right still exists and whether it is worth exercising before any demand is sent.
Licensees rarely deny the contract. They dispute the arithmetic. The most common defences are a different reading of the royalty base, a claim that returns or deductions were not credited, an assertion that reporting periods were suspended by force majeure, or an argument that the claim is time-barred under the governing law.
Each of these is defeated by the same material: reconciled sales data set against the contractual formula, correspondence showing continued exploitation after the alleged suspension, and a clear record of when the arrears became known to the licensor. A claim built on a spreadsheet dispute settles faster than one built on an allegation of concealment, because concealment invites a longer fight over disclosure.
Jurisdiction and governing-law clauses decide where that fight happens. Cross-border licensing contracts are commonly governed by choice-of-law rules under the Rome I Regulation within the European Union, and enforcement of a resulting judgment against assets elsewhere in the bloc runs through the Brussels Ia framework. Outside the Union, an arbitration clause referring to the New York Convention 1958 is often the more reliable route to an enforceable outcome against a licensee with assets in a different country.
The work starts with the licence and the statements, not with a demand letter. We assess the formula, the reporting gap, and the strength of the independent exploitation evidence before deciding whether the claim justifies cross-border action at all.
Where a pre-legal approach is appropriate, that step is carried out by admitted lawyers and licensed providers in the jurisdiction concerned. SOLUTIO coordinates the file and the strategy; it does not itself contact the debtor as a collection function.
If the licensee does not respond on the merits, the route follows the contract's own dispute clause – litigation in the agreed forum, or arbitration under the agreed rules. Where the debtor holds assets in a state that is party to a relevant enforcement instrument, recognition of an award or judgment there is the practical target rather than a fresh trial on the same facts.
The licence agreement, the royalty statements the licensee has issued, and independent proof of exploitation such as sales, distribution or platform data. Correspondence acknowledging a shortfall strengthens the file considerably.
Yes, but the route is less predictable. Absent a chosen forum, general rules on jurisdiction and applicable law apply, and we assess which forum gives the more enforceable outcome before advising on strategy.
It depends on whether the licensee disputes the underlying figures or only the calculation, and on the forum set by the contract. A claim resolved on reconciled statements moves faster than one contested on the facts of exploitation.
A licence that keeps generating sales while the statements go quiet puts the licensor in a position where the wrong first move – a demand sent before the figures are reconciled, or a claim filed in the wrong forum – can cost more than the shortfall itself. Reviewing the contract and the reporting gap before acting is what keeps that choice from becoming the second problem.