Intellectual Property: Business Policies and Business Law - Essay Example

? Intellectual Property: Business Policies and Business Law Intellectual Property: Business Policies and Business Law Introduction Intellectual property is a broad and complex term that generally refers to specific intangible creations of an individual’s mind. Business laws have set some exclusive rights for intellectual property holders in order to ensure their creations’ protection. Intellectual property law mainly protects the rights on intangible assets such as music, literature, art, discoveries and inventions, phrases, symbols, and designs. In some jurisdictions, copyright, patents, trademarks, trade secrets, and industrial design rights are also considered as common intellectual properties. This paper will discuss the business policies and needs regarding the creation and protection of intellectual property. Intellectual Property (IP) policies or laws As stated above, IP can be referred to an intangible form of property and it is entirely different from a personal property or real property. Knowledge and innovations have great roles to play in improving organizational performance. Nowadays, people recognize products in terms of brand names and hence companies give major focus on the promotion of their brand names. As Bagley and Dauchy (2011, p. 492) point out, individuals are given certain exclusive rights for the preservation of their intellectual property because governments and other legal bodies believe that the intellectual property rights would encourage the creators to make further innovations that may benefit the society as whole. For instance, recently Samsung and LG jointly paid $964 million to Kodak in order to settle the intellectual property law infringement battle. Similarly, Kodak has also filed a suit against Apple’s iPhone and RIM’s Blackberry for the breach of patent laws. The extent of protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights largely varies from country to country. This global difference in intellectual property policies becomes a troublesome issue in international economic relations since the concept of intellectual property has been turned into an important part of trade. As a result, recently new trade rules for intellectual property rights have been globally agreed which serve as an effective way to introduce more predictability in international trade relations (WTO, 2011). Both common law and statute play a significant role in the IP law relating to the creation and protection of intellectual property. Trade secrets are established on the strength of common law. In order to protect those trade secrets, both contract law and tort law provides certain legal options. Since trademarks, patents, and copyrights are under private ownership for a restricted period of time, specific statues are concerned with the creation and serving of such concepts. Similarly, artistic works such as books, photographs, paintings, and movies are subjected to copyright law. It is observed that businesses most often take advantages of trademark and patent laws since they are the primary beneficiaries of the protected property’s commercial value. US Constitution and Congressional legislature is the major institution responsible for the governance of copyrights and patents whereas state and federal laws are concerned with dealing with trademarks and unfair competition disputes. Since patent law is a very complicated and broad one, several adjustments are made to patent law according the nature of breach of contract. Most areas of the international IP law are governed by the federal as well as international treaty laws. The significance of protecting intellectual property was firstly expressed in the “Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property in 1883 and the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works in 1886” (Understanding copyright and related rights). Industrial property and copyright are the two broad classifications under the concept intellectual property. Industrial property is concerned with the protection of inventions while copyright works for the protection of literary and artistic works. Under industrial property policies, the specific ideas behind the inventions are protected. In contrast, the copyright laws protect the form of expression of specific ideas. As Bagley and Dauchy (2011, p. 89) comment, the most fascinating feature of a protected intellectual property is that the owner may use it exclusively when the third parties cannot use this property lawfully without the creator’s authorization. Copyright is classified into two such as economic rights and moral rights. Economic rights permit the owner to take economic advantages of his work while the moral rights allow the owner to ‘preserve the personal link between himself and the work’ (WIPO). The rights owner can prohibit its public performance, reproduction in different forms, broadcasting, translation, and any type of adaptation. At the same time, the IP laws also put some limitations to rights. In some countries, copyright protection would not be available to works unless they are fixed in tangible form. For instance, a work of choreography would get statutory copyright protection if and only if it was recorded on the form of dance notation. As Bagley and Dauchy (2011, p. 517), reminds, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is a global organization formed to ensure that the intellectual property rights are protected worldwide. FUJIFILM Corporation Vs St. Clair Intellectual Property Consultants, Inc (2008) is a well known example for intellectual property rights case. Need of intellectual property policies Intellectual property policies or laws produce productive effects across the globe as they serve the interests of rights owners as well as the society as a whole. Anti-plug molding law, Initial Interest Confusion, Fair Copyright in Research Works Act, Uniform Trade Secrets Act, and Satellite Home Viewer Reauthorization Act are some of the subcategories of United States intellectual property law. The main benefits offered by the intellectual property laws include financial incentive, economic growth, and morality. 1. Financial incentive The exclusive rights offer some financial rewards to the rights owners for the property they have created. Hence, the creators get a financial incentive for the innovation and investment in intellectual property. In addition, the rights owners get the costs paid associated with research and development. 2. Economic growth Similarly, the intellectual property policies play a very crucial role in the economic advancement of a country. Recently, economists have estimated that the large US business houses’ two-thirds of the value can be identified in the form of intangible assets. In order to measure the impact of IP system on six Asian countries, the WIPO and the United Nations University jointly conducted a research project and its results indicated “a positive correlation between the strengthening of the IP system and subsequent economic growth” (Measuring the economic impact of IP systems, 2007). In addition, other models like Nash equilibrium model suggests that rights holders would prefer to operate in countries where they get better protection from IP laws. The 1986 reform in Taiwan led to the formation of a stronger IP system in the country, which subsequently resulted in an increase in direct foreign investment and thereby rapid economic growth. 3. Morality The well known philosopher Ayn Rand (1905-1982) opines that the creation and protection of an intellectual property is a moral issue. Psychologists argue that all property at the base of human mind is intellectual property. Hence, the violation of intellectual property laws reflects the infringement of basic human rights. Cyber space protections for intellectual property Since the emergence of digital technologies, the concept of intellectual property has undergone tremendous transformations. As a result of rapid technological development, it is easy to make identical copies of digital products; and the illegally made copies can be economically distributed to a large number of recipients. The novel digital rights management (DRM) technologies enable the rights holders to practice an unprecedented control over the use and dissemination of digital goods. “Eventually IP and technology polices will determine, where the balance between access and control, between diffusion of and exclusion from IP will be drawn” (Internet governance information service). Evidently, it is inevitable to design effective cyber space protective measures for digital intellectual property. Sample form of company policies In order to protect its intellectual properties such as software and technological inventions from hackers and unauthorized dealers, a company must develop its own specific policies relating to the protection of IP and Cyberspace. The terms of the policies may vary from company to company according to the nature of the business which the company deals with. However, some common policies that a company should practice to protect its intellectual property rights are given below; The company must formulate special provisions regarding patent thickets, convergence, and open source software if necessary. The company has to specifically address subject areas like copyright, trademark, patents, and confidentiality in order to ensure comprehensive IPR coverage. The company must give grater emphasis on the effective implementation of the proposed IPR standards. Since patent issues are very complex to resolve, the company has to develop specific patent standards by sorting and analyzing the patent issues under the common headings of ‘Who’, ‘What’, ‘When’, ‘Where’, ‘How’ and ‘Why’. Finally, the company has to clear its viewpoint on the current debate topics such as ex ante disclosure, royalty free licensing, opens source licensing, harmonization, and RAND specificity. Conclusion The different types of intellectual property involve copyrights, trademarks, patents, industrial design rights, and trade secrets. New globally agreed intellectual property trade rules have been introduced with intent to promote predictability in global trade. Intellectual property policies bear long term benefits as they effectively preserve the interests of rights holders. It is necessary to provide improved levels of cyber space protection to intellectual property in the changing technological environment. References Bagley, C. E & Dauchy, C. E. (2011). The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Business Law. (4th Edn), USA: South-Western Pub. Intellectual property in cyberspace. (n.d). APDIP: Internet Governance Information Service. Retrieved from http://ncsi-net.ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/cyberspace/law/apdip/apdip_new/intellectual_property_in_cyberspace.htm Measuring the economic impact of IP systems. (2007). WIPO. Retrieved from http://www.wipo.int/portal/en/news/2007/article_0032.html Understanding copyright and related rights. (n.d). WIPO: World Intellectual Property Organization. Retrieved from http://www.wipo.int/freepublications/en/intproperty/909/wipo_pub_909.html World Trade Organization. (2011). ‘Intellectual property: Protection and enforcement’. Retrieved from http://www.wto.org/english/thewto_e/whatis_e/tif_e/agrm7_e.htm Read More