The Agreement

The purpose of setting up escrow-agreement is on one side to protect the clients long-term business continuity. But at the same time the agreement protects the source code of the supplier. This is provided for by placing the source code of the used application in our secure vaults and wil be kept for save keeping independent from the client and the supplier.

If for any reason you the supplier are no longer able to meet your contractual obligations, this will mean that Escrow Europe will release the source code of the used application to the client.

Examples of ‘Trigger Events’ for the release of the source code are:

• Liquidation;
• Ceasing to trade;
• Failure to meet maintenance obligations;
• IPR assignment (if new owner provides no escrow protection).

There are two types of Software Escrow agreements:

• Three party escrow-agreement:
  A three party escrow-agreement is a contract between a supplier, one user and  Escrow Europe. The user is the sole beneficiary in the agreement.
  As a supplier you are ensured that your intellectual property is in safe hands. Escrow Europe is fully independent hence is not allied to software suppliers or hardware manufacturers. Example of a three party escrow-agreement.
  


• Two party escrow-agreement:
  For a software supplier, arranging escrow contracts for individual customers can be very time consuming. A two party escrow-agreement offers the perfect solution in the case of 'standard' software. With this type of escrow-contract - also known as frame-agreement - you offer your clients certainty in continuity. All licensees automatically become beneficiaries of the escrow arrangement. The escrow contact becomes a standard component of the Service Level Agreement. Example of a two party escrow-agreement.