intelligence

C PROTECTING YOUR ASSETS

It’s essential to ensure your intellectual property is protected when developing exports in overseas markets, advises Emma Jones

When trading overseas, just as when doing business in the UK, you will want to ensure your intellectual property (IP) is protected. You may decide to register a trademark to protect your company name or brand or, if you’ve come up with a unique invention, a patent. Registering either means that companies can’t come along and use your name or invention without your permission.

THE WHO’S WHO OF IP There are four different kinds of IP that you can protect: 1. Patents: these are, essentially, what makes things work. For example, says the Intellectual Property Offi ce (IPO), ‘what makes a wheel turn or the chemical formula of your favourite fi zzy drink’.

2. Trademarks: these are ‘signs (like words and logos) that distinguish goods and services in the marketplace’.

3. Designs: what a logo or product looks like, ‘from the shape of an aeroplane to a fashion item’.

4. Copyright: an automatic right that comes into existence for anything written or recorded.

The UK’s IPO allows you to carry out searches, register trademarks and read up on all things IP-related, including details of what to do when your business goes global. The IP of your product or service is based in the territory in which it is delivered. This means that if you have protected your IP in the UK, the protection may not apply overseas. Certain countries will extend your UK protection, after completing local requirements.

SUCCESS ON A PLATE Entrepreneurial duo Sam Bompas and Harry Parr launched Bompas and Parr in the UK in 2008 and have been protecting their IP ever since. They have gained a reputation for making amazing jelly creations and producing bespoke jelly moulds and kitchenalia. A year after launch, Bompas and

Parr turned its attention overseas: “In 2009, we focused on the US market, then made waves in Europe and the plan for throughout 2011 is to raise our profi le in Asia. “We do this through going to cookery

shows, being seen in the media and lecturing about jelly. This has resulted

in us working for the likes of Kraft, a restaurant in Singapore and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. “The secret to our success is the

niche we have created. If you want a jelly experience, making it or admiring it, we have become the go-to company and as we are currently the only one in the world, it means we happen to attract quite a bit of international attention.” As a fl edgling global company,

Bompas and Parr is protecting its position through safeguarding its IP and continually coming up with new innovations. These include a current project working with a group of international neuroscientists to concoct a jelly that responds to a person’s brain waves!

COPY THIS To fi nd out more about registering trademarks and patents or protecting copyright overseas, visit the Business Link website www.businesslink.gov.uk and the international section of the IPO at www.ipo.gov.uk With advice, you can trade safe in the

knowledge your assets are protected, wherever your products are sold.

e

Emma Jones is founder of small business support company, Enterprise Nation (www.enterprisenation.com) and author of Go Global – how to take your business to the world (www.goglobalguide.com).

springboard: | page 46