It appears Bill Lawrence and Wajcman have never operated a company together with "Bill Lawrence" in its name!
Bill Lawrence is clearly an anglicized form of Bill's Germanic name "Willi Lorenz Stitch" and is legally recognised as such by the US courts. [Willi Lorenz Stich has been known as Bill Lawrence for four decades, not least by the international music press and community.]
All patents belong to Bill Lawrence, ie, Stich, Willi Lorenz.
Various retailers sell pickups designed by Bill Lawrence that have been updated or superseded, and which are made for Wajcman without any involvement from Bill Lawrence.
Bill Lawrence® is the registered service mark (trademark) of Bill Lawrence (Stich, Willi Lorenz). [NB. There are no essential differences between a trademark and a service mark. A service mark could even be argued to have an even wider application than a trademark.]
Key points (extracted and summarised from the
Bill Lawrence Website):
1. Pre-1965: Bill designs various pups.
2. 1965: Lawrence Electrosounds formed to make pups for different guitar manufacturers, but not aftermarket replacement pups.
3. 1966: Wajcman becomes majority stockholder.
4. 1970: Wajcman closes Lawrence Electrosounds.
End of chapter 1:
Nothing there.
5. 1975: Lawrence Sound Research, Inc (LSR) formed.
6. 1978: Bill became the sole stockholder.
7. 1982: On-Site-Music issue begins, and Wajcman ends up with 50% of LSR.
8. 1982: Wajcman and Bill form a second coterminous corporation, The Lawrence Connection (TLC).
9. 1984: Thru a series of events, and with Bill overseas, Wajcman, via his offshore company Degalim, gains control of LSR and TLC.
10. 1984: Wajcman/Degalim does a deal with Moridiara Company to make Fender and Gibson rip-off guitars under the Bill Lawrence name.
11.
1984: On-Site-Music sues for right to use the name Bill Lawrence (the name Willi Lorenz Stitch, world-renowned pup designer/expert, is now internationally known as), and wins an uncontested judgement (with Bill still in absentia and without the requisite financial resources).
12. 1986: TLC closed.
13.
1987: On-Site Music goes under, and Bill returns to the US, pays up, and is released from the 1984 judgment.
End of Chapter 2:
On-Site obviously no longer have rights to the "Bill Lawrence" name (and neither do Wajcman/Degalim/LSR/TLC). [Therefore, there are no legitimate claims to any pre-existing common law trademarks. Furthermore,
it appears no claims have ever been properly indicated or maintained.]
It appears that no rights to the name "Bill Lawrence" are assigned to Wajcman/Degalim, despite using the name in association with Moridiara since 1984.
It appears Wajcman/Degalim never did have any rights to the "Bill Lawrence" name, in any sense, as "Lawrence" was the only name making up LSR and TLC, not "Bill Lawrence".
It appears Wajcman no longer operates LSR.
It appears Wajcman does not own any currently registered company or corporation. [Wajcman has apparently recently registered the business names "Bill Lawrence Guitar Pickups" and "Bill Lawrence Products" with the County of San Diego, registration number 2003019052.]
It appears Wajcman
may have some right, by default, to use the name "Lawrence".
... ich hab so n BL USA teil...hat schon den richtigen DIME-Charakter...worum es ja eigentlich geht weil den dime-sound (wie jeden anderen zb hetfield, wylde usw.) wird niemand von uns richtig zusammen bekommen...also is es im prinzip scheiss egal ob man den duncan den BL L500XL oder den USA kauft mir gefällt im grossen und ganze schon mal die tatsache dass die teile alle nicht so langweilig klingen wie die EMG's die ja schon jeder pimpf hat 
ich hab übrigens aufnahmen von nem gig vom 29.11.2004 (dh. mit krank und dean und SD) 
