Intellectual Property Types

Article of the week

Kirsteen Mackay (Value the Markets): Intellectual Property (IP): An Investor’s Guide

Core Ideas

1) Trademark: A trademark can be a word, phrase, symbol, design or combination thereof that identifies a product or service and distinguishes it from competing offerings.

2) Patent: A patent describes an invention (physical object, process, design) and grants the inventor exclusive rights to it. This prevents others from copying, selling or using it without permission.

3) Copyright: A copyright grants creators the automatic legal right to use (reproduce, distribute, sell) their original creative works (books, music, artwork) and license them to others.

4) Trade secret: A trade secret is a confidential recipe, process or practice that provides some economic benefit.