Understanding the Concept of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) as an Intangible Asset for Trading (Business) Activities
By Ferianto, S.Si., M.H.
Intellectual work produced by humans through the sacrifice of time, effort, thought, costs a lot. It is hoped that the overall sacrifice is that the creator of the work will receive a proportional return on economic benefits for the utilization of the intellectual work. However, just producing works is not enough for creative actors to get legal protection. They have to seek legal protection through the mechanism for applying for intellectual property rights to the state, which of course requires costs and time.
If an intellectual work has been produced and has received complete and appropriate legal rights according to the type of intellectual property protection, then it can be said that the work with intellectual property rights can already be used for business or trading activities. This is because registering IPR and then getting proof of registration and IPR certificates, the hope is that registration documents and certificates are not just for decoration and display on the walls of the house. However, furthermore, IPR owners are expected to utilize these IPRs for economic activities, establishing cooperation with potential partners, trading and other business activities. For example, registering a trademark for one particular product, the main purpose and objective of which is of course that the mark will be attached continuously to the product that will be traded to consumers so that they are gradually able to build a strong identity and reputation for the product.
Furthermore, other parties can use registered marks that already have an identity and reputation through commercial cooperation schemes, for example licenses, franchises or other schemes. This illustrates how strategic an IPR registration is for business development. An IPR must be seen as an intangible asset that will indeed have economic value as the IPR-based business develops.
Also Read: Intellectual Property Oriented Innovation Strategy
Why is it called an intangible asset? The illustration is as follows. In the IPR system, a person who physically controls an object does not automatically have exclusive rights over that physical object. This means that there are intangible rights that appear in the object (intangible). For example, if someone buys a book (physical book) then he fully controls the physical book he buys. However, exclusive rights such as the right to reproduce and then buy and sell are not owned by that person. This is because the person bought the physical book, not the copyright contained in the book. These invisible rights have economic value, so HKI is usually called Intangible Assets.
The understanding of IPR as an intangible asset is often still not understood in the community so that it seems as if registering IPR is only a formality for protection. Thus, if the understanding is still like that, then economically the IPR registration activity will seem unattractive. In fact, conceptually, IPR registration is a business investment that can increase economic benefits.
