Who is Owner: IP Law
In the context of IP law, ownership is defined and based on the types and the circumstances of the intellectual property laws in place. Patents, trademark and copyrights are defined differently in Europe, the U.S., and Asia. Below is a quick comparison of the ownership terms of the different law systems in the United States and Europe. United States Patent: only the inventor of the patent can apply for a patent and the inventor will need to assign their inventions to the employer if the requirement is listed in the contract of employment. Copyrights: the Copyright Act’s initial ownership rule states that the ownership of copyright initially belongs to the author or authors of the work. However, the “author” of work made for work belongs to the employer or the hiring party for whom the material is prepared for. In the case of joint authorship, the authors of a joint work own jointly of the work they created. Copyright law also distinguishes the ownership of a copy from the ownership of the original work. The transfer of a copy of a work doesn’t transfer any of the ownership rights of the original work. Trademark: A trademark is defined as "any word, name, symbol, or device or any combination thereof" used by a person "to identify and distinguish his or her goods, including a unique product, from those manufactured or sold by others and to indicate the source of the goods, even if that source is unknown." Trademark is protected by the trademark law. Different from patent, the owner can use the mark for business without any application; however, the mark will not automatically become a trademark, the owner or user must use the mark on or in connection with products or/and service. The mark owner can federally register the mark to prelude from infringement nationally. If an applicant satisfied the application requirements, the first user of the mark is entitled to register the mark with the United States Patent & Trademark office. Europe Patent: usually in many European countrie with a civil law system, if the invention is created through the employment duties of the employee (inventor), the invention can pass to the employer. Thus, the employer can apply for a patent. Exceptions to this rule do exist, however, e.g. in Germany, the employee is considered the economic owner unless the employer explicitly compensates the employee. Copyrights: considering the U.K. and the U.S. both adopt the common law system, we will discuss the European countries with a civil law system. In Europe, only the employee’s computer programs are regulated at the European level, which means that if the computer program is created during the execution of the duties of the employee, the employer is the legal owner of the creation.    |
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