Managing Your Intellectual Property Assets Effectively

It’s amazing how little is generally understood about the role of Intellectual Property (IP) in business. Most people automatically think about patents when IP is mentioned. But it really is very much more. To borrow a definition from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO); “Intellectual property refers to creations of the mind – everything from works of art to inventions, computer programs to trademarks and other commercial signs.”

Patents certainly are part of the picture, but so is branding (product shape, name, colors, catch-phrases, and logos). Anything that is associated with your product or company is part of the intellectual property assets of your business. Large international companies often are strongly associated with a logo (Apple is a good example). The logo, just by itself, didn’t make Apple grow. But what it did was that it helped create the association between a brand new technology (the personal computer) and its prospective customers. It helped establish Apple as the company for PCs with a certain design aesthetic and ease-of-use.

Just about any creation can turn into a valuable bit of IP. Recent estimates put the value of the Apple logo somewhere north of $100 billion. Of course not every logo will hit that mark, but it does say something about paying attention to capturing the ideas that make your product and services memorable and different from your competition.

There are a number of software companies that offer software that will manage your IP assets. Most are geared toward patent management. This is fine if your company has a large technology component to what you do. If your needs lean toward branding and market differentiation, then you will need a more specialized software. In either case, engaging the services of an IP lawyer would be worthwhile as well. The main steps that you need to take in order to support your IP efforts are as follows:

• Ensure that your IP is unique. You will need to sort through past examples and make sure your invention truly is something new. On-line databases are easy to access and check. This so-called “prior art” is a way to prove the novelty of your invention.
• The bar is established a little differently for branding efforts (logos and such). If we keep with our example of Apple; they obviously did not invent the fruit, but they were the first to make that association between the apple (fruit) and the Apple (company). That is a unique combination and having a bite out of the apple in the logo makes it clear that it is an apple rather than a cherry and adds to the uniqueness
• Once it has been established that a novel product, feature, or service needs protection, the next step is to file your claim to that IP. Different IP is handled differently and copyrights are a unique form of IP. Copyrights are protected at the moment of their creation – but to make it formal requires a registration which allows for use of (C) symbol when you distribute your written creation.
• Assume you get awarded with the patent, copyright, or logo design, you need to make sure you use it regularly and that the protected IP is marked with a patent number or the copyright symbol (C).
• Lastly, you will need to watch out for infringers. If someone use a photo, technology, or a symbol which is confusingly similar to yours, you have the right to prevent them from continuing to use your IP, or to work out some sort of monetary solution such as a licensing agreement. You may want to farm out the search for infringers, or develop that as an in-house skill.

Those are the basic steps to developing IP. There is a lot of recordkeeping involved, mostly designed so that you can claim ownership if you are ever challenged, and also to allow you to prevent unwanted use of your IP. Not all ideas need IP protection, and just having a bit of IP doesn’t guarantee success. But if you solve an industry-wide problem in a unique way, or come up with a memorable phrase or clever logo that really represents your company, it just might be money well spent.