The importance of Protecting Intellectual Property

patent, copyright, infringement, intellectual property, trademark

What is Intellectual Property?

Intellectual Property (IP) is an exclusive rights associated to creations of the mind. Under which, intangible assets such as inventions, literary and artistic work, designs, and phrases, symbols and images can be protected. This protection can be obtained thanks to different kinds of IP rights like patents, trademark, designs, copyright, and enables their owner to earn recognition or financial benefit from their creation or invention.

Types of Intellectual Property

Patent

A patent is a title that provides its owner the right to prevent others from exploiting the invention mentioned in the patent. Also, it does not allow by itself making or selling an invention but it rather gives the right to exclude others from making, using, selling, or importing the patented invention.

Therefore, patent consists of a deal between inventors and society:

For the inventor – a patent is the way to prevent competitors from copying its invention
For society – a patent consists on improving innovation process by the public disclosure of innovations.

Trademark

A trademark is a sign by which a business identifies its products or services and distinguishes them from those supplied by competitors. Likewise, trademarks can be distinctive words, marks, or other features. Its purpose is to establish in the mind of the customer a link between all the different products and/or services that the company offers and then distinguish them from those supplied by competitors.

Design

Designs are concerned with the features, the appearance of a part or the whole product:

Two-dimensional features such as patterns, lines, and/or color
You can protect the three dimensional features such as shape, texture, and or surface of an article by the design. This will happen only if you do not dictate the functional considerations.

Also, it includes the right to make, offer, put on the market, import, export, or use a product. You must incorporate the design to which you apply it, or to stock such a product for those purposes.

Copyright

Similarly, copyright is a legal term describing rights given to creators for their original literary, musical, or artistic works which allow them to control their subsequent use. These include for example:

computer software
drawings, maps, charts, or plans
photographs and films
architectural works
sculptures
sound recordings
TV and radio broadcasts

Moral rights – which are not transferable and give the creator the right to be identified as the author of the work and the right to object to any distortion or mutilation of the work.
Economic rights – which entitle the owner to control the use of its creation in a number of ways (making copies, issuing copies to the public, performing in public, broadcasting, etc) and to obtain an appropriate economic reward.

Why it is significant to protect intellectual property

Intellectual property backs immeasurably to our national and state economies. Also, dozens of industries across our economy rely on the adequate enforcement of their patent, trademark, and copyright, while consumers use Intellectual Property to ensure they are purchasing safe, guaranteed products. So, let us explain some major aspects.

Intellectual Property boost your competitiveness

Companies can increase their competitiveness in a variety of ways by dedicating time and resources to the importance of their Intellectual Property (IP) protection. Moreover, IP assets are a source of value for companies and also reasons why you should manage them as part of a business strategy. For instance, it can help to promote a company to a leading role in its business/trade field.

Intellectual Property Creates and Supports High-Paying Jobs

Intellectual Property intensive industries employ hundreds of millions of people worldwide.
Moreover, you can expect jobs in Intellectual Property intensive industries to grow faster over the next decade than the national average.
The average worker in an Intellectual Property intensive industry earned about 30% more than his counterpart.
The average salary in Intellectual Property intensive industries pay per worker is far more compared to the national average.

Intellectual Property Drives Economic Growth and Competitiveness

Intellectual Property intensive industries account for over 1/3– or 38%– of total GDP.
Similarly, these industries also have 72.5% higher output per worker than the national average.
Intellectual Property accounts for a great significance in exports.

IP as an asset with a high potential value

Intellectual Property rights, whether it is a patent, a design or other form of rights, represent an investment with an expected return. Therefore turning an invention into a marketable product and potential source of steady income is a crucial stage in the innovation process and IP rights help businesses to protect and prevent their market shares.

Intellectual Property Rights enforce Consumers and Families protection

Strong IP rights help consumers make an educated choice about the safety, reliability, and effectiveness of their purchases.
Enforced IP rights ensure products are authentic, and of the high-quality that consumers recognize and expect.
IP rights foster the confidence and ease of mind that consumers demand and markets rely on.

Intellectual Property Helps Generate Breakthrough Solutions to Global Challenges

Nearly all of the 300 products on the World Health Organization’s Essential Drug List, which are critical to saving or improving people’s lives around the globe, came from the R&D-intensive pharmaceutical industry that depends on patent protections.
Also, innovative agricultural companies are creating new products to help farmers produce more and better products for the world’s hungry while reducing the environmental impact of agriculture.
IP-driven discoveries in alternative energy and green technologies will help improve energy security and address climate change.

Intellectual Property Rights Encourage Innovation and Reward Entrepreneurs

Risk and occasional failure are the lifeblood of the innovation economy. IP rights incentivize entrepreneurs to keep pushing for new advances in the face of adversity.

Conclusion

In short Intellectual Protection rights are important because they can:

Set your business apart from competitors
Be sold or licensed, providing an important revenue stream
Offer customers something new and different
Also, form an essential part of your marketing or branding
Be used as security for loans
Intellectual Property as a source of competitor monitoring

Protect it against breach by others and ultimately defend in the courts your sole right to use, make, sell or import it
Stop others using, making, selling or importing it without your permission
Also, earn royalties by licensing it
Exploit it through strategic alliances
Make money by selling it

Bringing all of these important and diverse points together is the fact that protecting Intellectual Property is a non-partisan issue that is shared by a broad coalition of interests. These rights are embraced by all areas of industry—small, medium and large companies. So, We at KLAPakistan are keen to assist you in every step of protecting your intellectual property either a trademark, copyright, design and patent.

Also read our extensive article on Company Registration in Pakistan.

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