Company: GLPG
Filing Date: 2025-03-27
Form Type: 20-F
Source: 0001558370-25-003806
Chunk: 49

Company: GALAPAGOS NV
Filing Date: 2025-03-27
Form: 20-F
Item: Item 3
Chunk 49
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 party’s relationship with us. These agreements also generally provide that inventions conceived by the party in the course of rendering services to us will be our exclusive property. However, these agreements may not be honored and may not effectively assign intellectual property rights to us. Adequate remedies may not exist in the event of unauthorized use or disclosure of our confidential information. The disclosure of our trade secrets would impair our competitive position and may materially harm our business, financial condition and results of operations.
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In addition to contractual measures, we try to protect the confidential nature of our proprietary information using physical and technological security measures. Such measures may not, for example (without any limitation), in the case of misappropriation of a trade secret by an employee or a third party with authorized access, provide adequate protection for our proprietary information. Our security measures may not prevent an employee or consultant from misappropriating our trade secrets and providing them to a competitor, and recourse we take against such misconduct may not provide an adequate remedy to protect our interests fully. Enforcing a claim that a party illegally disclosed or misappropriated a trade secret can be difficult, expensive, and time-consuming, and the outcome is unpredictable. In addition, courts outside the United States may be less willing to protect trade secrets, with protection varying across Europe and in other countries. Trade secrets may be independently developed by others in a manner that could prevent legal recourse by us. If any of our 

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confidential or proprietary information, such as our trade secrets, were to be disclosed or misappropriated, or if any such information was independently developed by a competitor, our competitive position could be harmed.
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We will not seek to protect our intellectual property rights in all jurisdictions throughout the world and we may not be able to adequately enforce our intellectual property rights even in the jurisdictions where we seek protection.
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Filing, prosecuting and defending patents on our current and future product candidates in all countries and jurisdictions throughout the world would be prohibitively expensive, and our intellectual property rights in some countries could be less extensive than those in the United States and Europe, assuming that rights are obtained in the United States and Europe. Furthermore, even if patents are granted based on our European patent applications, we may not choose to perfect or maintain our rights in all available European countries. In addition, the laws of some foreign countries do not protect intellectual property rights to the same extent as laws in the United States and Europe. Consequently, we may not be able to prevent third parties from practicing our inventions in all countries,