Developing an Intellectual Property Policy

1. Overview
Intellectual property (IP) for the company refers to any copyrights, trademarks, patents, trade secrets, and any other information that is related to the company's services and products (Biagioli, Jaszi, & Woodmansee, 2015). The company is committed to competing fairly in the marketplace. This commitment to fairness will include respecting the intellectual property of our clients, customers, suppliers, business partners, and competitors. No company employee, agent, or independent contractor should steal, misuse, copy or distribute the intellectual property rights owned and maintained by others. The purpose of this policy is to ensure that the company maintains its reputation as a fair competitor, guarantee the integrity of the competitive marketplace in IP, and to comply with the laws regulating IP and industrial espionage.
2. Scope
This policy is applicable to all employees of the company, agents, independent contractors, directors, and officers. Subsidiaries, partnerships, business units, and joint ventures where the company owns majority shares or exercises management control are also covered in this policy. The policy covers the company's IP, and also that of its clients.
3. Policy, Standards, and Guidelines
a) Patents
The patent refers to the legal right granted to someone to exclude anyone else from marketing or manufacturing the company's unique and tangible things. A patent can also be registered in a foreign country to assist in keeping international competitors from discovering what the company is doing. The patents currently held by the company can only be used under license from the company. Patents do not just refer to the patents owned by the company, but this also includes patents owned by others. No company employee is authorized to make use of another person's or company's patent without first obtaining permission from the owner of the patent. The same applies to all company-owned patents, no employee should give out any of the company's patents without the individual having followed the right process for obtaining approval to use the patent.
b) Trademarks
A trademark refers to the word, slogan, a symbol for good or services that are associated with a particular company. For example, "Jaguar" is a trademark for a particular type of car that is manufactured by the Ford Motor Company. The term trademark also includes logos.
The trademarks of the company are the logos, slogans, software developed in-house, and services offered. No one is authorized to use the trademarks of the company for their own personal gains.
c) Copyrights
A copyright is a legal right in any expression of an idea that is a work of original authorship fixed to a tangible medium (Bradner & Contreras, 2017). For example, movies, books, photos, software, music, and sculpture.
The company has copyright protection on its software, including any fixes to bugs, user manuals, and training courses for the software. The content published on the company website, marketing materials, training videos, and any other original authorship that is fixed to a tangible medium created by the company is also copyrighted. Copyright infringement will also include employees installing software that has been illegally downloaded from the internet, providing copies of software to clients without the proper license, copying documentation that belongs to others without permission, and installing software on more than one computer without a license.
d) Ownership of company material
All company materials remain the property of the company and employees, directors, independent contractors, officers, and agents are only authorized to use the materials when they are conducting business for the company. Usage of such materials for other purposes will be an infringement of the company's IP policy. Any material that is not been used outside the company should be maintained within the company offices and kept safe. Any software, documentation, training video, or licenses are owned by the company and licensed to other for usage for a particular purpose. Any other usage apart from what is authorized will be an infringement.
4. Intellectual Property Violation Reporting Procedures
The legal department is charged with implementing the recommended company IP policy (Soomro, Shah, & Ahmed, 2016). In case of any infringement or violation of a part of this policy, the person observing the violation should report the violation immediately to the legal department. The procedure for reporting requires one to indicate the particular violation been done, the person(s) carrying out the violation, location where the violation is taking place, and time they saw or noticed the violation. This is not only applicable to the company IP but covers the IP of others. If an employee is caught misusing the IP of others within the company, the company would be held liable. Therefore, it is appropriate that all employees be on the lookout for the violation of other IPs.
5. Intellectual Property Infringement Ramifications
If a person violates copyrighted work they are liable to pay damages for works they copyrighted. The damages are aimed at compensating the copyright owner for any harm that might have occurred. In regards to the company, employees who infringe on the IP of others will result in the company being sued and the lawsuits could result in huge sums of money being paid by the company. On the other hand, if an employee violates any IP owned by the company, the company has the right to sue the said employee in order to compensate for any damages that this violation might have caused to the company. The IP policy clears indicates what is covered in the IP of the company and employees need to ensure that they observe and respect the IP of the company and of the clients that the company offers its services.
References
Biagioli, M., Jaszi, P., & Woodmansee, M. (2015). Making and unmaking intellectual property: creative production in legal and cultural perspective: University of Chicago Press.
Bradner, S., & Contreras, J. (2017). Intellectual Property Rights in IETF Technology (2070-1721). Retrieved from
Soomro, Z. A., Shah, M. H., & Ahmed, J. (2016). Information security management needs more holistic approach: A literature review. International Journal of Information Management, 36(2), 215-225.