As an entrepreneur, your brain is constantly buzzing with new ideas. These could be about your products and services, marketing strategies, or packaging methods.
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| How to Protect an Idea |
The tricky part is that you can't keep these ideas to yourself—you have to pitch them to potential partners or investors.
In this context, it's natural to worry that someone might steal your idea before you can bring it to life. To prevent this, there are several steps you should follow, which we'll discuss in this article.
Evaluating the Idea to Protect
First things first, you need to evaluate your idea to determine the best strategy for protecting it. Ask yourself the following questions:
- How original and inventive is your idea?
- How developed is it, and can it be implemented immediately?
- What is its relevance, usefulness, and economic potential?
- Who do you need to protect it from, and who might have access to your idea?
By answering these questions and developing your responses, you'll be able to identify not only the type of protection your idea needs but also the budget you should or can allocate for this purpose.
Industrial Property Rights for Idea Protection
Industrial property rights are designed to give their holder exclusive rights to exploit an idea within a given territory for a certain period.
Patent Protection for an Idea
A patent protects any product or process idea for 20 years within the entire European Union. Your idea must comply with public policy and good morals. It must also be new, inventive, and feasible in the industrial or agricultural sector.
Design and Model Protection for an Idea
This protection relates to the appearance (contours, shapes, lines, colors, etc.) of an idea. Among the requirements are novelty, originality, and the tangible nature of the idea. You could protect your idea for a maximum of 25 years, renewable up to four times.
Trademark Protection for an Idea
In this type of protection, it's not the product itself that's protected but the image associated with it. This can include texts, designs, numbers, etc., which must be distinctive, available, and legal.
Copyright as a Means of Protecting an Idea
It's important to note that copyright doesn't fall under industrial property law. It consists of two parts: moral rights, which are attached to the person and are inalienable, and economic rights, which can be granted or transferred.
The latter becomes the author's property for the rest of their life and is transferred to their heirs for 70 years after their death.
Additionally, software that cannot yet be patented is now protected under copyright law.
How to Protect the Secrecy of an Idea
Unfortunately, some ideas can't be protected by intellectual property rights, even though their economic value is undeniable. For example, certain types of know-how or manufacturing processes fall into this category.
Sometimes, it's not the idea itself that's the issue, but rather the financial constraints of protecting it. Filing a patent can be costly. Another reason to keep an idea secret is simply that it’s in your best interest not to have it known, for one reason or another.
In these three scenarios, protecting the secrecy of an invention can be very beneficial, even necessary. The goal is to safeguard your idea throughout its development and/or protection process.
This starts with preparing a technical file that identifies the most secretive part of the idea—the part that can only be disclosed in exchange for financial compensation and a guarantee. Next, a confidentiality agreement should be signed with company collaborators.
This agreement is valid for the duration of the contract and remains in effect even after the contract is terminated. An internal control system should also be put in place.
Then, you should sign a confidentiality agreement with all your partners, even if—or rather, especially if—you’re not sure you’ll be working with them for a long time.
This agreement is crucial because it ensures that third parties will keep the secret in case of contract termination or negotiation breakdown.
Finally, in certain cases of know-how or technology transfer, a system to control the protection of the secret must be established.
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