Do I own the code and IP?

Your company does. With LaunchPad, you own the code and the intellectual property (IP) in what we build for you. At launch, the accounts it runs on are yours too, so another team can pick it up without asking our permission.

That sounds like it should go without saying. Under UK law, it doesn’t, which is why we say it.

Why this needs saying at all

In the UK, whoever writes code owns the copyright in it, unless they write it as someone’s employee. An agency or freelancer is not your employee. So by default, they own what they write for you, even after you’ve paid the invoice.

You only own it if a written, signed assignment transfers it to you. Plenty of founders find this out when they try to leave a developer, or when an investor’s lawyers ask. Neither is a fun week to learn it. Our guide to who owns your code explains the law properly. It’s general information, not legal advice.

With us, the question is settled before work starts. Our contract assigns the IP in that work to your company, in writing.

What you own

• The source code. Everything we write for your product, with its full history.
• The designs. Wireframes, the interface design and the prototype made for you.
• The documentation. How the product is built, run and deployed.
• The data. Your users’ data was never ours. It sits in your systems.

Ownership means you can change the product, hire someone else to extend it, raise money against it or sell the company. You don’t need us for any of it.

If we bring in anyone else to work on your product, their work is assigned to you too. That keeps the chain of ownership intact, which is the first thing a buyer or investor checks.

What you don’t own, and shouldn’t expect to

Every modern product is built on things nobody owns outright, and that’s normal.

We can give you a list of the open-source libraries in your product and their licences. That’s worth having before any due diligence, which is the checking investors and buyers do before they commit money.

Code you own needs accounts you control

A copyright you can’t reach doesn’t help much. Ownership on paper and control in practice are two different things.

During the build, the accounts sit with us or with you, whichever you prefer. At launch they’re yours either way. Each one can be moved:

• GitHub repositories transfer to your organisation, with their history.
• Your AWS setup is a whole AWS account, run under our AWS Control Tower, and it moves out to you.
• App Store and Google Play apps transfer between developer accounts.

What you get access to, and when, is covered in do I get access to the code, CMS and analytics?

Ownership starts before the build. Will you sign an NDA? covers protecting the idea before anything is written.

No platform to be locked into

Some agencies build on their own in-house platform, or rent you a white-label product with your logo on it. Either way, the code was never yours to own. Leaving means starting again.

We write your product for you, so there’s nothing of ours you’re renting. If you ever want to move on, the handover is a list of transfers, not a rebuild. Do you provide training or handover support? explains what that handover includes.

If another agency built your product and you want out, can you take over an app another agency built? covers how that works.

If you’ve been burned by an agency that held your code, what if an agency has let me down before? is written for you.