|
| |
IPAN issue brief - no. 1
intellectual property - why it matters
Intellectual property (IP) rights are
designed to strike a balance between rewarding inventors / creators for their
innovative efforts, while ensuring that society at large benefits appropriately.
For example, patents allow inventors to control the use and exploitation of
their inventions for a certain period of time (20 years at the most). In return,
they must allow the public and their competitors full access to the details of
their inventions, so that new technology is not kept secret and further
developments are facilitated.
Trademarks lend distinctiveness and, often, value to products which may give
trademark owners a significant competitive edge in the market place. However,
trademarks are also used by customers as quality assurance devices, allowing a
degree of certainty over a product’s quality, effectiveness, taste, purity etc.
Again, there is a balance between benefits for the trademark owner and benefits
for the customer and wider community.
For creative industries copyright protection is vital to ensure that commercial
benefits accrue to creators and those that have invested in nurturing,
publishing and promoting creative talent. This is always balanced by the need to
ensure that the public has appropriate access to information, and that copyright
enforcement is not such that it inhibits creativity and communication
unnecessarily.
IP rights have become increasingly important to the UK economy and, indeed, to
most economies. The UK has always been a leader in inventiveness and creativity
in many industry sectors (for example, music, design, pharmaceuticals,
biotechnology and publishing). We have a “knowledge-based” economy which
relies heavily on effective IP protection, for the benefit of IP users and
owners alike.
Recently, the UK government carried out a Treasury, major review of IP led by
Andrew Gowers. This review concludes that:
“The increasing importance
of knowledge capital is seen in its contribution to the value of firms. In
1984 the top ten firms listed on the London Stock Exchange had a combined
market value of £40 billion and net assets of the same value. Advance twenty
years and the asset stock of the largest firms has doubled while their
market value has increased nearly ten times.”
The effective use and exploitation of
IP increasingly underpins our economic success and the well-being of our
society.
last revised: dec 06 under review:
jul 08
suggested links for further
reading:
page last revised:24 Sep 2008
|
