Intellectual Property Protection Challenges

The internet has upsides and downsides. This statement holds because the internet can give you so much and take so much away from you.

This is especially the case when we think about business intellectual properties. While the internet can help propagate your intellectual assets and use it to create broader brand awareness, grow your customer base, and increase sales and revenue, it can also be the same medium through which your business most valuable assets such as ideas, concepts, inventions, and innovations are taken away from you.

To prevent this from happening, many companies make sure to put one or two intellectual property protections in place.

What is intellectual property?

Intellectual property (IP) is an intangible asset in the form of names and logos, images and symbols, designs and inventions, software and technologies, etc., created and owned by a person or company. The property which may be created literally, artistically, technically, or scientifically needs to be a product of an individual’s intellect to be called his or her intellectual property.

Owning an IP can be very beneficial to your company. For instance, it can give you an edge and increase your chances of competing in the global market and give you the right motivation to continue with research and development that can lead to the discovery of even more profitable innovations.

This explains why you could require protection for an IP (if you have any) to stop others from copying, use, or replicating your property.

Why is intellectual property important?

As the world is becoming a more competitive place, companies that must thrive need to have some form of edge. This edge which makes businesses unique, is often gotten in the form of intellectual properties. This is to say that companies with these intangible assets tend to do better than companies that do not.

Intellectual property is considered to be necessary for the following reasons:

• To encourage global participation and competition

Facebook, Apple, and Google are known worldwide, mostly because they have these unique and priceless intellectual assets that they have created and are protecting.

Your best chance of having a competitive advantage in the global market is to have what nobody else can have or use; intellectual property.

• To help create brand uniqueness

Customers are usually drawn to businesses that they can recognize anywhere and at any time. There could be many ways to make sure you stand unique in the market, but one of the most effective is to have an intellectual asset.

• To help foster research and development

Useful innovations are usually a result of intense research and development. These are activities that companies will only dedicate their time and resources to when they are sure they are on the verge of acquiring some intellectual properties.

Challenges of monitoring and protecting intellectual properties

While intellectual properties are essential, their protection is considered to be even more critical. It was reported that IP theft alone costs the US economy anything from between $225 billion to $600 billion every year, and this is prompting more and more companies to protect their IPs.

However, intellectual property protection is not without its challenges. And some of these challenges include:

• Different locations

This could, perhaps, be one of the most significant challenges creators and owners are confronted with when seeking to protect their IP. Protection laws and the way and manner they provide ownership control can differ across borders.

You are likely to encounter this challenge if you are a U.S. business owner looking to take your business to other countries such as the U.K. or China. The different locations could also imply different legal systems and even the chance of IP theft.

Solving this problem entails investigating what the laws in those places stipulate about intellectual property rights before even making a move. Additionally, you may be required to protect your assets better by applying for rights in the new country.

• Cost of getting an IP protection

IP rights are not very expensive to obtain; however, since it adds to the overall cost of running a business, many companies, especially small and medium-scale ones, tend to shy away from it. The cost of getting one differs according to the country, and according to the type of IP protection you require.

In the U.S., for instance, a trademark and copyright may cost between $225 to $325 and $25 to $100, respectively (excluding searching and Attorney fees).

• Data extraction process

To ensure successful IP monitoring and protection, a business would need to gather high-quality data on a large scale and from multiple e-commerce websites. And while this may prove a serious challenge for companies that cannot afford the necessary tools screening these e-commerce sites is vital to monitor and catch counterfeiters in time. If you want to learn more about collecting data for intellectual property protection and its challenges, visit the Oxylabs website for more information.

Conclusion

Intellectual property protection can be a challenging process for several reasons. However, when we consider how much individual companies and the general economy loses to counterfeits and lawsuits fighting infringers yearly, then we may start to think less of these challenges and simply get it done.