COMPONENTS OF IPR

Copyright:

The term ‘copyright’ concerns the rights of the creators/authors of literary and artistic works. A copyright is also called a ‘literary right’ or ‘author’s right’. Copyright gives an author exclusive rights to his creation and prevents the copying and unauthorized publishing of his work. Copyright protection begins at the very moment a work is created and expressed in some tangible form. Copyright protects the following two rights of the author:

1. Economic rights – the right of the owner to derive financial benefit from the use of their works by others.
2. Moral rights – protection of non-economic interests of the author.

• Literary works
• Computer programs
• Films, musical, and choreography
• Artistic works
• Architecture and advertisements, maps, and technical drawings.

Patents:

A patent is an exclusive right granted for an invention or innovation, which might be a product, a method or a process, that introduces a novel way of doing something or offers a new technical solution to a problem. In other words, it is a right of monopoly granted to a person who has invented:

1. A new and useful article, or
2. Improvement of an existing article, or
3. A new process of making an article.

A patent is granted for inventions having industrial and commercial value. It is the exclusive right to manufacture the new article/manufacture the article with the invented process for a limited period of time in exchange for disclosure of the invention. A patent owner can sell his patent or grant license to others to exploit the same.

1. It should be novel.
2. It should have inventive steps or it must be non-obvious.
3. It should be capable of Industrial application.

Trademarks and Service marks:

A trademark is a symbol that is used to distinguish the goods of one enterprise from its competitors. A trademark may consist of a single letter, logo, symbol, design, or numerals and three-dimensional features such as shape and packaging, etc. Trademarks Act 1999, defines “trademark” as a mark capable of graphical representation and which can be used to distinguish the goods or services of one person from those of others. Hence, distinctiveness is the hallmark of a trademark.

Trademarks used in connection with services such as tourism, banking, etc., are called Service Marks. The owner has the exclusive right to the use of a registered trademark. There are 45 classes of trademarks, consisting of 34 classes of products and 11 classes for services.

• Identifies a product and its source.
• Goodwill of a business.
• Quality of the product.
• Advertisement for the product.
• Legal protection to our brand.
• Preventing others from imitating.

Industrial Designs:

An industrial design is purely aesthetic, non-functional, and has no utility. It is necessary to provide legal protection to the creative originality of an industrial design to prevent others from copying it.

• Handicraft items
• Household goods
• Lighting equipment
• Electronic devices
• Textiles