Recession Survival Tips

By Janet Garner

Intellectual property (IP) is a list of various types of legal monopolies over creations of the mind, both artistic and commercial, and the related areas of law.  Under intellectual property law, owners are granted particular sole rights to a sort of intangibles, such as musical, literary, and artistic works; ideas, breakthroughs, and inventions; and words, phrases, symbols, and designs.  Trade secrets, copyrights, patents, and trademarks are four main kinds of intellectual property.

Copyrights deal with protection of original literary and other creative works.  They are used to secure the ownership of works like poems, songs, stories, movies etc.  By making use of copyrights, the owner can legally guard the expression of an idea for a certain period, during which only he or she has the authority to reproduce it, permit its adaptation, exhibit it to people, or sell it off.  The creator has a claim over his work for more than 50 years, which remains even after his death and any unlawful use of the work within this period is treated as an offence.

Patents on the other hand are legally defined rights that allow an inventor to check others from manufacturing or marketing his or her invention.  They provide safety not only for technological inventions and new theories in science but also for discoveries such as biological ones.  The legal cover offered by a patent in most countries is for a period of 20 years, after which the invention ceases to be the sole property of the patent owner.

Trade secrets are those classified pieces of information that help a firm to score over its rivals in the market.  A trade secret could mean anything ranging from a client database with the names and addresses of most valuable clients to a unique recipe or even some secret research.  In most cases, trade secrets are issues pertaining to in house management of the firm, which do not call for any kind of government intervention.  The common steps taken by a company to safeguard trade secrets include keeping the information confined to a select handful of managers, or even keeping it secured in some bank vault.

Trademarks, on the other hand, include one or more words, designs, or logos that are associated with the firm on the whole or its products and services, which distinguish them from the competition.  Trademarks develop a brand identity that enables the consumers recall or identify the manufacturer on noticing the trademark.  Usually trademarks hold good for 10 years after which a renewal is often required.

Discover more about () Trademark Registration Singapore and discover how Intellectual Property Protection increases the net worth of your business very fast.