Posts Tagged ‘business idea protection’
Infringement of a trademark has become a crucial issue in this age of high competitiveness. But how is it possible to determine when a particular trademark is said to be used unlawfully by a company? There are a few aspects that need to be examined for finding out whether the trademark has been violated by another firm.
The primary aspect is to study the likeness between the two trademarks with respect to appearance, sound, meaning, pronunciation and spelling. If the likeness between the trademarks on any one of these factors is substantial to create confusion in a consumer’s minds, it will amount to trademark infringement. This would make it difficult for the consumers to pick the authentic items, and they might end up purchasing fake ones, causing revenue loss to the company with the genuine trademark. You must remember that if the pronunciation is quite similar, change in spelling can be insignificant as far as trademark infringement is concerned.
The second factor is how the products or services provided by manufacturers with similar trademarks are linked to each other. There will be significantly lesser chance of confusion if the products or services are entirely unrelated to each other.
Another essential factor is how conscious the customers of the items or services in question are. Closely resembling trademarks will not develop confusion in the minds of intelligent consumers who carry out a detailed study of the item that they wish to buy. Such customers are armed with comprehensive information about the competing brands and thus they are not puzzled by closely resembling trademarks.
It is the uninformed shopper who in his hurry might choose a counterfeit product from the shop by not being able to differentiate between the two trademarks. He would not be aware of the subtle differences between the two trademarks, which in turn will increase the chance of his buying a counterfeit. This is one of the perfect examples of the kind of infringement of trademark that needs to be strictly dealt with.
Discover more about trademark registration Singapore and discover how does a patent lawyer and IP protection increase the net worth of your business very fast.
categories: IP law,IP lawyer,trademarks,patents,ideas protection,business idea protection,protecting business ideas,business value,copyright
The number of various types of legal monopolies over creations of idea, both artistic and commercial, and the corresponding fields of law is called Intellectual property (IP). Under intellectual property law, owners have exclusive rights to several intangibles such as musical, literary, and artistic works; ideas, discoveries, and inventions; and words. phrases, symbols, and designs. Copyrights, trademarks, patents and trade secrets are four main kinds of intellectual property.
Copyrights give lawful rights to published and unpublished original works. They protect the owner’s rights over pieces like musical scores, poetry, films, novels etc. It gives legal rights to the creator to use the expression of his or her original work in addition to reproducing, distributing, exhibiting or even selling it with complete freedom within the time decided by law. The creator has a claim over his work for more than 50 years, which is valid even after his death and any unlawful use of the creation within this time is treated as an offence.
Patents on the other hand are lawful and official rights that enable an inventor to prevent others from reproducing or selling his or her invention. Typically they are applicable to new theories in the realm of science, inventions in the field of technology and even biological discoveries. The legal cover offered by a patent in most nations is for a span of two decades, after which the invention ceases to be the sole property of the patent owner.
Trade secrets are certain confidential pieces of information that enable a company to score over its competitors in the market. A trade secret could mean anything ranging from a customer database with the contact information of most valuable customers to a unique recipe or even a confidential report. Usually, trade secrets are not governed by any government agency but by strict internal standards and policies of the particular company. Two methods used most often to protect a trade secret are storing it in a bank vault or confining it to a restricted number of executives, so that it is not accessible to several people and thus stays secure.
Trademarks are words, logos and designs that symbolize a particular brand or firm and separate it from the rival brands. Trademarks develop an exclusive brand identity for a firm and generate quick recall in the minds of consumers. Mostly trademarks hold good for 10 years after which a renewal is often required.
Discover more about trademark registration Singapore and discover how does an patent lawyer and IP protection increase the net worth of your business very fast.
categories: trademarks,patents,ideas protection,business idea protection,protecting business ideas,business value,copyright,Intellectual property,IP law
Trademark is an intellectual property right that safeguards certain images, texts etc of a company from being misused by others. The basic objective of trademarks is to ensure that people can purchase the correct products without being influenced by the spurious or counterfeited ones.
A trademark must be unique and distinct enough for the customers to identify it easily even amongst a crowd of similar products in the market. This distinctiveness of trademarks is recognized by slotting them into four basic categories – suggestive, descriptive, generic, and arbitrary or fanciful.
A descriptive mark is one that describes a product with respect to its quality or features like smell, functionality, form etc. Unlike other marks that are unique to a particular commodity, a descriptive mark is not unique and is not capable of being trademarked unless it has acquired a secondary identification and the customers start associating it exclusively with the commodity.
Suggestive marks on the other hand indicate a specific feature of the product. However, consumers might have to stretch their imagination to identify the real relationship between the product and the mark as there is no obvious connection between the two. For instance, ‘Hush Puppies’ is a popular brand name that sells footwear products that guarantee comfort and prevent soreness of your feet. The basic reason behind the brand name is that the problem of sore feet is loosely referred to as ‘barking dogs’ in some states in the US.
Arbitrary marks are those marks that do not have any connection whatsoever with the commodity itself. For example, the use of trademark ‘Apple’ with a logo of a half eaten apple is not at all related to the computers sold under the mark. Likewise, there is no relationship between the fanciful name Exxon and the items sold under the name as the name is a fruit of the creative mind of the marketing agents of the firm.
The final category of generic marks clearly identifies the items, like ‘camping gear’, and they cannot be given any trademark protection due to lack of distinctiveness.
Discover more about trademark registration Singapore and discover how does a patent lawyer and IP protection increase the net worth of your business very fast.
categories: copyright,business idea protection,protecting business ideas,business value,Intellectual property,IP law,IP lawyer,trademarks,patents
In this period of widespread internet usage, trademark laws gain special significance in the cyber world, especially in terms of trademarks for domain names. This is critical if you want to spread the word about your goods or services across to the consumers with the help of your domain name.
A trademarked domain name helps you in taking legal action against any individual, who steals your trademark and attempts to coerce people into believing that their products and services actually originate from you and that you are affiliated to their website.
Getting a domain name trademarked must always be preceded by comprehensive research, in order to prevent any possibility of trademark infringement. The search should involve a detailed study of marks that are quite similar in appearance, pronunciation or even meaning to the domain name you have chosen for your website. Get your trademark registered only after confirming that it will not lead to any potential trademark infringement claims.
For attaining this, it is preferable to hire the services of a cyber law attorney, who can guide you in your online trademark related issues. This will not only enable you to avoid violation claims but also protect you from future conflicts.
It is essential to note in this respect that a domain name can serve as a trademark only if it serves as an identifier of the goods or services of your business, and not just as an online address that brings web users to your site.
Other than domain names and their possible infringement, infringement of keywords is a new problem in cyberspace, wherein original trademarks are infringed and used as keywords in ads posted through Yahoo, Google, and MSN, with the deliberate intention of creating confusion in the minds of consumers.
Making use of such a keyword is not an infringement if the promotional ads result in boosting sales of the products or services behind the genuine trademark, but it is an infringement if the promoter starts making use of it as a weapon for competing against the trademark owner.
Discover more about trademark registration Singapore and discover how does a patent lawyer and IP protection increase the net worth of your business very fast.
categories: copyright,business idea protection,protecting business ideas,business value,Intellectual property,IP law,IP lawyer,trademarks,patents
A patent can prevent dishonest entities from making profits out of your inventions and hard work. However, to safeguard your interests in this respect, you need to get your invention registered by the relevant authorities.
Applying for a patent can be a really hard task. Mentioned below are a few points to aid you in raising the chances of acceptance of your patent application.
The first and most important factor is that your patent must establish itself as novel, utilitarian and non-obvious (NUN). In other words, your idea must be innovative and must be capable of business viability as well as marketability, as no governmental organisation would want to issue a patent for an ineffectual invention. You must hence ensure that your invention is not similar to some other commercial concept or should not be something that does not have a long term market worth. In addition, it must be non-obvious to other persons in that field, in the sense that others should not be able to come up with/arrive at the same idea easily.
You are also required to furnish all vital details of your invention when you are applying for a patent. In a few cases, you might also be required to incorporate designs of your invention in addition to the detailed description. This is essential because unless you have expressed the complex details of your development, the authorities will not be able to assess it exhaustively and compare it against existing products and other pending applications. Non inclusion of a comprehensive description can even lead to your patent filing being rejected.
The lengthy evaluation involved in patenting makes it a long and tedious process in many countries. Therefore, it is always better to engage the services of a lawyer, who has good expertise in working on patents or at a minimum in general intellectual property issues. This would not only save you time and effort, but also minimize the chances of your patent application being rejected.
Discover more about trademark registration Singapore and discover how does a patent lawyer and IP protection increase the net worth of your business very fast.
categories: IP law,trademarks,patents,IP lawyer,ideas protection,copyright,business idea protection,law,protecting business ideas,business value
