What Is Intellectual Property?
Intellectual property (IP) is a general term for the rights recognized by U.S. law for creations of the mind, including:
> Patents – rights granted to inventors for novel and useful inventions.
> Trademarks – rights granted to businesses relating to the branding of their goods and services (company, product and service names).
> Copyrights – rights granted to authors for tangible expressions of ideas (art, literature, music, software code, architectural plans).
> Trade secrets – rights granted to businesses relating to their unique and valuable intangible assets (business processes, client and customer lists, procedures, practices, formulae, research notes, market data).
Types of Patents
There are three types of patents that every startup should be aware of:
Utility Patents – According to the USPTO, utility patents are for inventions, “… of a new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or a new and useful improvement thereof.” Utility patents are for the protection of how an invention is used and works.
Business Method Patents – Business methods are also protectable under U.S. patent law. A business method patent is actually a form of utility patent that protects new methods of doing business, such as those used, for example, in banking, tax compliance, and e-commerce, to name a few.
Design Patents – Design patents, as described by the USPTO, are “Issued for a new, original, and ornamental design embodied in or applied to an article of manufacture.” A design patent, “permits its owner to exclude others from making, using, or selling the design.” A design patent may provide protection for IP when a utility patent is unavailable.
Read more >> https://www.upcounsel.com/blog/protecting-intellectual-property-easy-guide-startups
