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Intellectual property defined
You and your teammates have a great idea. How do you make sure that no one steals your great idea before you can get it to market?
The only way to keep your idea totally safe is to keep it locked up inside your brain. That’s the unfortunate truth. Probably the best approach is somewhere between total secrecy and publicly broadcasting your idea. As ex-Apple evangelist Guy Kawasaki puts it (see quote in Ideas 2), if it’s really a good idea, lots of people have probably already thought of it. To turn your idea into a commercially viable product, you’ll need to judiciously share it with others.
Knowledge is power
Naturally, you want to take whatever steps you can to protect your ideas. The following definitions will help you understand the differences between various types of intellectual property protection.
A note on lawyers
Intellectual property lawyers are specialists. If you're serious about patenting an idea, you probably need one. They're generally not cheap, but they do focus on particular scientific disciplines, making it worth your while to find a good one. You also probably need a general business lawyer or "corporate counsel," who can advice you on everything from incorporation to sales contracts. But be aware that it's rare to find one individual or even one law firm that can offer you both intellectual property and general business services.
The Patent
When you patent a product or an idea in the U.S., the government prohibits others from making your invention for up to 20 years. It sounds great at first, but patenting isn’t the ideal solution for every product. To get a patent, you have to file a patent application which describes your invention thoroughly, and explains why it should be considered novel. If the patent is granted, your invention is made public, so only the law prevents others from copying it. Patents can only be granted to inventors (not companies), so usually companies require their employees to sign over patent rights when they take up employment.
How to qualify for a patent
Patenting a product can be complicated and expensive. Sometimes it’s a better decision just to keep your idea or formula as secret as possible. An intellectual property attorney can advise you on whether filing for a patent is the best approach for protecting your idea.
Copyrights
Copyrights protect written materials of all kinds, including software. They don’t protect trade secrets. For example, if you publish information about your product, and the information that you publish is copyrighted, only the expression of the information, or the particular phrasing you choose, is protected—not the information itself. Once again, seek the advice of an intellectual property attorney regarding the correct procedure for copyrighting your work under federal law.
Trademarks
Trademarks are words or design elements, registered with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, that represent a company or product. They must be registered to be protected. Usually before you can register a trademark, you need to conduct a search, both through the USPTO and among unregistered usage, to see if any other company is already using it. Talk to your intellectual property attorney!
Trade secrets
Coca-Cola is an example of a company that uses trade secrets rather than a patent to protect its secret formula. If the Coke formula had been patented, the information would have been made public, and the patent would have protected the product for only 20 years. A company that uses trade secret protection has to make efforts to prevent disclosure of its important ideas--once ideas have leaked, nothing will prevent other companies from using them.
Companies keeping trade secrets require employees and investors to sign confidentiality agreements. Trade secret laws and protections vary from state to state. You need to know the limits of trade secret law within your state—again, an intellectual property lawyer can help.
Going international
If you plan to sell your product internationally, you need to decide early whether or not to file for an international patent. U.S. patents are only valid in the U.S. Talk to your intellectual property attorney.
Our source for these and many other useful definitions is http://www.growco.com.
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