Small and medium entrepreneurs are being encouraged by the government to make use of Intellectual Property Rights to enhance their product and protect their product.
Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) are intangible assets that an SME can apply for a patent because these are the product of the mind and the intellect of the individual. A IPR attached to a product can add more value to a product as well as being useful in protecting their ownership over it.
Intellectual property (IP) is an asset that any person can own, sell, license and with a patent on it, can be protected from theft or unauthorized use.
Examples of items that can be considered as IP are: copyright and related rights, trademarks and service marks, industrial designs, patents, layout designs, geographical indications.
Intellectual Property officials recently came to Davao to open a satellite IPO office housed in the DTI Office at Monteverde Street in the Uyanguren District.
The purpose of the IPO Davao Office is to assist applicants in registration of their IPR, extend mentoring in good patent proposals, IP workshop to help clients learn the craft of preparing patent applications.
Despite the availability of patent lawyers and patent consultants, if one has the time, one can go about applying for a patent on his own. Intellectual Property Attorneys are specialists in patent law, who aside from being able to assist you in patent filing, can also help you in defending your IPR.
Companies in manufacturing spend a lot in patent research to make sure that they are not overstepping into another person’s intellectual property rights. If their design does cross into another person’s patented design, then they usually buy the patent from that person or license rights for the design.
Processing time for a patent application is about 3 to 4 years depending on the complexity of the design. It will then be published in a newspaper to check whether there is any objection to the application. Meanwhile Trademarks take about 4 ~ 6 months to get approval.
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