Intellectual Property Key Concepts

Property Rights

Property concerns ownership of a thing, such as real estate or tangible personal property. The owner of property has a bundle of rights, which includes the rights to use, possess, transfer, and exclude others from the property.

Intellectual Property

Intellectual property involves protection of the creations of the human mind. The law of intellectual property defines the legal rights of owners of the products of inventive and creative work.

Trade Secrets

A trade secret is any form of (1) information that (1) has economic value from not being generally known to, or readily ascertainable by proper means by, others and (2) has been the subject of reasonable efforts by the owner to maintain secrecy. A trade secret can be any type of confidential business information, including formulas, patterns, compilations, programs, devices, methods, techniques, and processes.

Patents

A patent grants an inventor the exclusive right to exclude others from making, using, selling, or importing the invention protected by the patent. An inventor may obtain a utility patent on a process, machine, manufacture, composition of matter, or an improvement of any of these.