What is
Intellectual Property or IP?
Intellectual Property represents the property of your mind or
intellect. In business terms, this also means your proprietary knowledge.
Following are the types of Intellectual Property or IP:
·
Patents – for new or improved products or processes
·
Trademarks or Service marks – for letters, words, phrases, sounds, smells, shapes, logos,
pictures, aspects of packaging or a combination of these; to distinguish
the goods and services of one trader from those of another
·
Designs – for the shapes or appearance of manufactured goods
·
Copyrights – for original material in literary, artistic, dramatic or
musical works, films, broadcasts, multimedia and computer programs
Creating IP does not mean you own rights to it! – You must take
formal steps to register your IP and obtain the legal rights of ownership.
Otherwise, you will have to rely on common law to prove ownership and prior
use for non-registered IP.
Note: Registering your
IP rights in UAE does not give you international protection. You must apply
for this separately.
You should develop strategies to protect your IP
rights – Fail to do so and you may put your business at risk. Do not
talk about your idea or make it public too soon, or you may lose the legal
right to exclusive use of your IP. Different IP rights vary in the
protection they provide. Often, more than one type may be necessary to
fully protect your creation. You can also find out more IP strategies with
our Web site.
Protocol Intellectual Property