"Engineers are very bright, highly educated individuals," says Genet. Genet, a partner with Nixon Peabody LLP in Chicago, indicates the top two IP issues affecting engineers are failing to seek patent protection for new innovations and publicly disclosing new inventions before filing a patent application, resulting in a waiver of their patent rights. But if the legal rights are lost, the disk or prototype may be worthless - even if securely in hand."Īlthough there are multiple aspects to IP protection, all engineers must be very familiar with patent law (if software is involved that could include copyright law as well). "These rights are the legal essence of an engineer's output, for if an actual disk or prototype is lost, another can always be had. "Every schematic, each piece of software code, and every drawing, diagram, and prototype has intellectual property rights attached upon creation," states the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers in its publication Intellectual Property and the Employee Engineer. Rights related to copyright include those of performing artists in their performances, producers of phonograms in their recordings, and those of broadcasters in their radio and television programs."Įngineers, then, are professional innovators who work in the realm of industrial property and are often the first involved in creating a proprietary design or invention. IP is divided into two categories: industrial property, which includes inventions (patents), trademarks, industrial designs, and geographic indications of source and copyright, which includes literary and artistic works such as novels, poems and plays, films, musical works, artistic works such as drawings, paintings, photographs and sculptures, and architectural designs. Some scientists, however, are more interested in focusing on the technology and don't always realize the finer (or more nebulous) points of protecting IP.Īccording to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), intellectual property refers to "creations of the mind: inventions, literary, and artistic works, and symbols, names, images, and designs used in commerce. As consultants, they also share intimate details of their clients' designs, materials, products, and processes-highly confidential work. Intellectual property (IP) protection is absolutely critical for protecting a company's proprietary designs, processes, and inventions that, if leaked to competitors or made public, could ruin a company's market advantage and reputation or lead to costly litigation.Įngineers are often on the front line of innovation.
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