As your new invention comes to light, your initial thought may be to let the world know. While shouting your success from the rooftops is appealing, before you do, you need to consider how best to protect what you have worked so hard to develop. Patents and copyrights can offer you some security, but don’t always mean that your design is completely protected, as copies can certainly emerge. There are, however, a number of other options available to you, each with their own strengths. Below, 10 members of Forbes Technology Council weigh in on some less-common, yet still effective, ways to protect your intellectual property. Here’s what they recommend: 1. Don't File Patents The most uncommon way to protect intellectual property is not to file patents. Filing patents provides the recipe of how a product or service can be created. Once a recipe is published, one can create a similar product with workarounds to not violate the intellectual property rights. The second method is to standardize the idea with a standards association, so that others are blocked from creating such an idea. - Naresh Soni, Tsunami ARVR 2. Run Lean And Fast Innovation in the tech sector will always be prone to plagiarism. To some extent, that's what drives innovation's evolutionary jumps in such quick succession. Having relentless innovation cycles keeps your competitors constantly catching up. That does require your company to run like an Olympic runner — lean and fast. - Daniel Hindi, BuildFire 3. Separate Teams Our engineering teams are separated geographically, and we make a point that none of these teams have access to the complete product. In order to undermine the security and sanctity of our product, several of these teams would need to work together to steal the total product. Separation of duties is a basic tenet of information security, and we have to practice what we preach. - Tim Maliyil, AlertBoot 4. Open-Source It It may seem counterintuitive, but one of the best ways to build a competitive advantage is to open-source your technology and tap into a broad community of developers. This way, your company can focus on the added value on top of the technology stack that remains proprietary, and can execute with speed and agility. - Winnie Cheng, Io-Tahoe LLC 5. Avoid Joint Ownership Make sure to avoid joint ownership of intellectual property at all costs. Joint ownership creates problems later on that could make it difficult to protect, hurting all parties involved. - Chalmers Brown, Due 6. Get Exact-Match Domains If you can, one of the best intellectual property securement methods for trademarks (that you actually own) is an exact-match domain name. While a costlier objective in the short run, the windfall of benefits in the long run is unrivaled. - Michael Gargiulo, VPN.com 7. Safeguard With Strong Access Control Store manuscripts, creations and all ideas in a safe place that’s protected by an identity and access-management solution. With 81% of breaches being due to compromised credentials, it’s essential to store intellectual property on a system that uses adaptive authentication with risk analysis, or at least two-factor authentication. Passwords alone are obsolete. - Keith Graham, secureauth.com 8. Get Strong Non-Disclosure Agreements Get assistance with creating well-written non-disclosure agreements. Also, look at any other agreements you use in your business to make sure they cover your intellectual property. These could include employment agreements, licenses, and sales contracts. - Muhammed Othman, Calendar 9. Keep It Quiet And Out Of Sight Classic ways of protecting IP often involve patenting or copyrighting works and techniques, and vigorously defending them in court. Modern techniques involve using Digital Rights Management systems. A now somewhat uncommon way that is still effective is to simply keep things secret and limit exposure to the trade secrets that make up the IP, and design the system to keep them hidden. - Chris Kirby, Voices.com 10. Publish It Widely With Attribution While patents require being the "first to file" in the U.S. these days — and that's still the best way to protect your non-trade secret IP — another common way to ensure that your IP is seen as yours is to publish and reference it widely, always ensuring that your company's name is attributed to where it is mentioned. The more you are seen online with your IP, the more support your patents have. - David Murray, Doctor.com
Intellectual property (IP) refers to creations of the mind, such as inventions; literary and artistic works; designs; and symbols, names and images used in commerce. IP is protected in law by, for example, patents, copyright and trademarks, which enable people to earn recognition or financial benefit from what they invent or create. By striking the right balance between the interests of innovators and the wider public interest, the IP system aims to foster an environment in which creativity and innovation can flourish. Test your knowledge of IP with our quiz
Featured (Photo: GEBER86 - E+)IP and mobile applicationsFind out how IP mechanisms help mobile application developers and publishers generate more income from their creations.
(Photo: iStockphoto.com/professor25) Copyright is a legal term used to describe the rights that creators have over their literary and artistic works. Works covered by copyright range from books, music, paintings, sculpture and films, to computer programs, databases, advertisements, maps and technical drawings. (image: clipart.com) A patent is an exclusive right granted for an invention. Generally speaking, a patent provides the patent owner with the right to decide how - or whether - the invention can be used by others. In exchange for this right, the patent owner makes technical information about the invention publicly available in the published patent document. (image: WIPO/Gen a) A trademark is a sign capable of distinguishing the goods or services of one enterprise from those of other enterprises. Trademarks date back to ancient times when artisans used to put their signature or "mark" on their products.
(image: courtesy of mihail stamati) An industrial design constitutes the ornamental or aesthetic aspect of an article. A design may consist of three-dimensional features, such as the shape or surface of an article, or of two-dimensional features, such as patterns, lines or color. (Photo: iStockphoto.com/mattjeacock) Geographical indications and appellations of origin are signs used on goods that have a specific geographical origin and possess qualities, a reputation or characteristics that are essentially attributable to that place of origin. Most commonly, a geographical indication includes the name of the place of origin of the goods. (Image: Getty images/South_agency) Trade secrets are IP rights on confidential information which may be sold or licensed. The unauthorized acquisition, use or disclosure of such secret information in a manner contrary to honest commercial practices by others is regarded as an unfair practice and a violation of the trade secret protection.
WIPO runs workshops, seminars and training courses throughout the year, both in Geneva and worldwide. Year-round roving seminars help businesses, researchers, lawyers and innovators stay on top of latest developments in global IP services.
The WIPO Academy offers distance learning and face-to-face courses. Choose from a rich portfolio of general and specialized courses on IP to improve your skills, whatever your level of knowledge or interest. Or explore the interactive IP PANORAMA e-tutorial.
(Image: WIPO) On April 26 every year we celebrate World Intellectual Property Day to promote discussion of the role of IP in encouraging innovation and creativity. Find out how you can take part. (Photo: WIPO) Subscribe for free to read stories, articles and interviews showing IP, innovation and creativity at work across the world. (Available in English, French and Spanish). (Photo: iStockphoto.com/timsa) Our outreach tools are free resources to assist IP offices and organizations in planning and implementing public campaigns to build better understanding and use of IP. (Image: WIPO) WIPO's award programs recognize innovators and creators, big and small, companies and individuals. The WIPO Awards Program includes both global and national awards.
(Image: WIPO) Find out how frontier technologies, including AI, are changing how we do business, how we innovate and create. (Image: STOCKPHOTOASTUR (ISTOCK/GETTY IMAGES PLUS) Men and women are equally as creative and innovative. Yet, women remain under-represented in many areas. Find out how WIPO works to tackle this issue. (Image: UN) IP is a critical incentive for innovation and creativity, which in turn are key to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) success. (Photo: alphaspirit/Getty Images) Understanding how IP serves technology transfer is the first step towards managing your technology transfer processes effectively.
(Image: Getty/ilyast) Learn how an understanding of IP can help businesses become more competitive and manage related risks. (IMAGE: GETTY IMAGES/MAXIMKOSTENKO) Universities and public research institutions are the factories of the knowledge economy. Discover how IP policies and knowledge transfer are critical to their work.
Find out how WIPO is supporting judiciaries in dealing with the novel legal questions that often arise from IP disputes in a rapidly changing technological environment. |