CHAPTER TWO
RELATED LITERATURE OF INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY MANAGEMENT AND PERFORMANCE
2.1 Introduction
In the field of economics, management and manufacturing, the literature on intellectual property has been rapidly expanding over recent years, particularly in developed countries. Access to data on intellectual property has been improved and methodological tools for understanding its role in the economy has been enhanced. Nevertheless, the empirical literature from developing countries and countries with economy in transition has remained very limited. This has constrained the ability of policymakers to take evidence based decisions on intellectual property matters and choose between different policies options (Ochigbo, 2010). This chapter will explore relevant literature on the topic under discussion to add to the literature of the existing knowledge.
This work is incomplete
2.2 Conceptual Framework
The term "intellectual property" refers to a loose cluster of legal doctrines that regulate the uses of different sorts of ideas and insignia (Fisher, 2000). Intellectual property is based on the power of imagination and talent. Idris(2012:7) aptly captures it as the ability to stand on an existing foundation of accepted knowledge and see beyond to the next frontier of discovery that is the source of personal, cultural, and economic development. The world intellectual property organization “WIPO (2001:5) defines intellectual property as creations of the mind, inventions, literary and artistic works, symbols, names and images used in commerce and industry. WIPO also observes that intellectual property is native to all nations and relevant in all cultures and that it has contributed to the progress of the society.
For Wathuming, et al (2012), intellectual properties are properties of intangible things. Intellectual property therefore refers to the property in creations of the mind, such as inventions, industrial designs, names, symbols, images among others.
There are two main concepts of intellectual property, the concept involving moral rights and that involving economic rights of a work.Belle(2006:34), definesintellectual property as any product of the human intellect that is unique, novel, and non-obvious, and has some certain placed value in the market. Inventions, business methods, industrial process, chemical formula and unique names all correspond to this definition. Similarly, all information products deriving their intrinsic value and creative expression, literally creations, ideas or presentations are also considered as intellectual property. Intellectual property thus concerns the production of information and knowledge.Somila (2000:9) aptly captures it asthe means by which we induce innovation to shift from one industrial structure to another and from a specific intensity of specialization to another. This inducement he observes cannot be achieved without protection of these properties by acquiring rights of ownership. If we think intellectual property rights as an inducement, then we need to acknowledge that means and goals may not be entirely separable and cannot be achieved without proper management of these rights and properties in our various firms. So also is the obvious fact that intellectual property management cannot be discussed without looking at the possible merits a proper and effective management will cause the firms to have one of which could be improving the performance of the firms. Adewopo (2002) posits that the nonexistence of a common Intellectual Property system in our country emanates from a prevalent pessimism towards harmonization. However, the full development of Intellectual Property in Africa and many developing countries depends on various factors both internally and externally.
2.2.8 Concept of Manufacturing Companies
Manufacturing firms are firms that are engaged in manufacturing of goods and services. These firms are classified into small, medium and large scale. Manufacturing firms are catalysts for industrial and economic development. They also play major role in international trade and foreign exchange earnings. As such, most countries encourage investment in industries through manufacturing companies. Onuoha, (2013:1) firmly suggeststhat Agriculture and Manufacturing are the preferred sectors of the economy and therefore the bedrock of economic and technological advancement. He then notes that if the lessons of the history of industrialization in the western countries or the TRIAD nations and the success of the Asian Tigers or the other emerging newly industrialized are anything to go by, the organized private sector (OPS), governments (at all tiers) and their agencies must play major roles in encouraging manufacturing firms in Nigeria. Highly developed manufacturing firms will lead to more research and development (R&D). There will also be more efforts to produce high quality products and contribute meaningfully to the country’s Gross Development Product,(GDP).
Manufacturing firms in Nigeria operate under an umbrella body known as manufacturers association of Nigeria (MAN). MAN is a powerful trade association and a strong member of the country’s organized private sector (OPS). MAN was established in May 1971 as a company limited by guarantee (Onuoha, 2013:9). It is a forum for private sector to formulate and articulate policy suggestions that would be complementary to government’s efforts at policy formulation. The manufacturers association of Nigeria is divided in Sectoral Groups of 10 Sectors and 77 sub- sectors. These are:
• Food, Beverage and Tobacco
• Chemicals and Pharmaceuticals
• Domestic and Industrial Plastics- Rubber and Foams
• Basic Metal Iron and Steel and Fabricated Metal Products
• Pulp, Paper and Paper Products, Printing and Publishing
• Electrical and Electronics
• Textile, Wearing apparel, Leather, Foot wear, Carpet
• Wood and Wood Products including furniture
• NonMetallic Mineral Products
• Motor Vehicle and Miscellaneous Assets
Gas users group is the most recent sector added to the number.
Source: Manufacturers Association of Nigeria, Membership Directory (2012), pg 13. Printed in Enugu by Fonts and Sables
Our manufacturing companies are more or less completely dependent technically and technologically. The mode of their manufacturing technique is both manual and machine operated. Complete automation of machine is completely a far cry.One reason that the cost of doing business in Africa is high is that firms often are required to make additional unofficial payments to ensure a steady supply of public services. This has been a detterent to the growth of these industries. A report that was focused on the performance of firms in Nigeria’s manufacturing sector drawing on the United Nation International Development Organisation (UNIDO) firm survey carried out in 2001 made it very obvious. The objective of that study was to identify the policy issues that needed to be tackled to reverse decades of poor performance in the economy of developing nations of the world. The incidence of additional payments with regard to public services and licenses and permits which actually decreases with firm size is one of the numerous issues identified by that report. Table 2.1 shows the report.
Table 2.1:
Estimated Proportions of Firms* that ‘Always’, ‘Usually’ or ‘Frequently’ Need to make Unofficial Payments; by Firm Size
NMicro Small MediumLarge
To get connected to Public Services= 131 0.680.53 0.55 0.45
To get Licenses and Permits = 132 0.50 0.52 0.48 0.43
To deal with Tax Collection =135 0.270.26 0.25 0.27
To gain Government Contracts =74 0.290.45 0.46 0.33
Source: Onuoha, B. C., (2013) “Factors Militating against the Global Competitiveness of Manufacturing Firms in Nigeria”. WIPO, International Journal of Contemporary Research,Vol. 3, No. 4 P. 47
2.3Theoretical Framework
2.3.1 Theoretical Perspective
Every research work is usually anchored on a given established theory for its analysis, fondly called theoretical framework. This research work has for that purpose, the modern theories of the essential variables involved in the work as its theoretical framework for analysis. In law reviews and in journals of economics and philosophy, articles deploying "theories" of intellectual property have proliferated. The essays usually canvass those theories, evaluate them, and consider the roles they do and ought to play in economics, management, sociology and lawmaking. This chapter surveys and synthesizes the deepening and widening theoretical landscape of intellectual property.
The principal philosophical theory applied to the protection of technology innovations is utilitarian works. Utilitarian theorists generally endorse the creation of intellectual property rights as an appropriate means to foster innovation. Non utilitarian theorists emphasize creator’s moral rights to control their work (Menell, 1999:11).
2.3.2 Theories of Intellectual Property
Fisher (2000:17) admits that most of the recent theoretical writing on intellectual property consists of struggle among or within four main approaches namely, Utilitarian, Labour, Social, and Personality theories.
Utilitarian Theory
First is the familiar utilitarian guideline. Menell (1999:30) indicates that the utilitarian theories of international property developed and evolved in a symbiotic relationship with the evolution of modern state from the formation and maturation of mercantilist nation- states through the industrial revolution to the rise of modern capitalist economy. Under this, managers and lawyers believe that the guideline should be the maximization of net social welfare in the context of intellectual property. An optical balance should therefore be struck between the power of exclusive rights to stimulate the creation of inventions and works of arts and on the other hand, the partially offsetting tendency of such rights to curtail widespread public enjoyment of those creations. In Lands and Posner (1996) sited in Fisher(2000:25), it is agreed that the distinctive characteristics of most intellectual property products are that they are easily replicated and that enjoyment of them by one person does not prevent enjoyment of them by other persons. For them, these characteristics creates a danger that the creator of such product will be unable to recoup their cost because they will be undercut by copyists who bear only the low cost of production and thus can offer consumers identical products at very low prices. Awareness of that danger therefore might deter innovators. Thus these economically inefficient outcomes can be avoided by allocating to creators exclusive rights for a limited number of years. For creators of work that consumers find valuable and for which there are no attractive substitutes, owners will be empowered to charge prices for access to those works substantially greater than they could in a competitive market. They contend that all other alternatives in which creators are empowered to recover their costs are more wasteful of social resources. The cost of expression to be recouped refers to the time and effort and money devoted to inventing the product or writing or composing it and the cost of putting it into tangible use. They therefore argue that the utilitarian rational has been and should be used to shape up doctrines within the field of intellectual property.
Another related argument by some authors dominates in their study of patents and trademarks where they identify the primary economic benefits as; reduction of consumers cost; creation of an incentives for business to produce consistently high quality goods and services (Land and Posner, 2002:27). Lands and Posner also claim that trademarks have unusual ancillary social benefits because they improve quality of language. This is because they increase our stock of nouns and create words of phrases that people value for their intrinsic pleasantness as well as their information value. These they argue simultaneously economize on communication costs and make conversations more pleasurable. They contend that intellectual property rights however can sometimes be socially harmful for example; enabling the first entrants into a market will discourage competitors by appropriating for itself an especially attractive costs or informative brand name. Markets should therefore be protected when and only when they are socially and economically beneficial and not when they are on balance deleterious.
Labour Theory
The labour theory was developed by Lockes in 1904. Lockes theory is one of the current dominant of the theoretical literature on intellectual property. In his approach, he contends that a person who labours upon resources that are either not owned or held in common has a natural property rights to the fruit of his or her labour and that the state has a duty to respect and enforce that natural rights. These idea of John Locke are widely and especially applicable to the field of intellectual property where the pertinent raw material which are facts and concepts do seem to be held in common and where labour seems to contribute so importantly to the value of finished products. Note that the inventions would not have existed at all without the effort of the inventor. However some critics argue that the acquisition of property rights through labour is litigate and should be allowed if and only if other persons do not suffer any net harm, for example, people being left poorer than they would have been because property right has constricted certain resources available for their use. For this reason, patents should not last longer than the time it will take someone else on average to invent same device if same opportunity is presented or the time an inventor would have recouped his cost.
Personality Theory
The writings of kant and Hagel gave promise to the third approach of intellectual property theory. They argue that private property rights are crucial to the satisfaction of some fundamental human needs. Policy makers should thus strive to create and allocate entitlements to resources in the fashion that best enables people to fulfill these needs. To this end, intellectual property rights may be justified on two grounds;
First, they shield from appropriation or modification properties of intellect and
Secondly; they create social and economic conditions conducive to creative intellectual activities which in turn is important to human flourishing (http://www.law.harvard.edu.academic affairs/iphistory.htm) viewed 13 September 2013.
Social Planning Theory
The social planning theory of intellectual property involves the political, economic and legal theory. This protagonist has an approach that is routed in the proposition that property rights in general and intellectual property rights in particular can and should be shaped so as to help foster the achievement of a just and attractive culture. Munzer (2001:19), observes that this inspiration was drawn from theorists like Jefferson, the early Max Werber, and legal realists and various other proponents of classical republican both ancient and modern. This approach is similar to the utilitarianism in its teleological orientation, but dissimilar in its willingness to deploy visions of desirable society richer than the conceptions of social welfare deployed by utilitarian’s,
(http://www.law.harvard.edu.academic affairs/iphistory.htm), Viewed March, 2014
Critics
The proponents also came out with critics;
That copyrights term should be shortened to increase the size of the public domain available for creative manipulation
That compulsory licensing system should be employed more frequently to balance the interest of artists and consumers of their work.
Theorists are; John Stuart Mill (1862) Jeremy Bentham (1839) and A.C. Pigou (1924)
Source: Menell, P.S. (1999) Intellectual Property: GeneralTheory;Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, University of California Printing, P.76-86
2.4 Theories of Performance
Job performance, being the set of behaviors that are relevant to the goals of the organization or the organizational unit in which a person works remains a primary concern for organizational behavior, Murphy, (1989) in (Brown et, al. 2010:2). Researchers; indeed have suggested that improving job performance is one of, if not the, primary purposes for organizational research and overall organizational performance. The fascination of performance as a topic holds for both researchers and managers and lies largely in the importance of such behaviors to the organization. Job performance has been shown to relate to an organization’s profit, effectiveness, and survival, thus befitting its role as a key construct in organizational research on performance. The standard of an organization in terms of proficiency, efficiency, effectiveness and general achievement of goals is a huge indicator of the performance of the individuals working in such organizations. Theorists and Researchers strongly recommend that performance be defined in terms of behaviors that are under the control of the individuals and that which contribute to the goals of the organization. Performance therefore consists of the behavioral and outcome aspect. The behavioral aspect refers to what an individual does in the work situation. It encompasses behaviors such as assembling parts of a car engine, selling personal computers, teaching basic reading skills to elementary school children, or performing heart surgery. Not every behavior is subsumed under the performance concept, but only behavior which is relevant for the organizational goals.
Researchers also agree that performance has to be considered as a multi-dimensional concept. On the most basic level one can distinguish between various aspects of performance. A process aspect called behavioral and an outcome aspect of performance.
Process aspect
The behavioral aspect refers to what people do while at work, that is, the action itself. Campbell et al, (1993:7) emphasizes that performance encompasses specific behavior like sales conversations with customers, teaching statistics to undergraduate students, programming computer software, assembling parts of a product. This conceptualization implies that only actions that can be scaled or counted are regarded as performance. Moreover, this performance concept explicitly only describes behavior which is goal-oriented.
Outcome Aspect: The outcome aspect in turn refers to the result of the individual's behavior. The actions described above might result in contracts or number of sales, students' knowledge in statistical procedures, a software product, or job numbers of products assembled.
Aspects of management like operations management, human resources, organisational behavior, information systems, marketing, and management accounting and control are also contributing to the field of performance measurement, (Neely, 2002; Marr and Schiuma, 2003; Franco-Santos and Bourne, 2005, in Brown et al 2010:89). While diverse and multi-disciplinary research on performance theory is appealing, it can also foster complications. Theorist also looked at what they call a Business Performance Management System, (BPM).
A Business Performance systems enables an enterprise to plan, measure, and control its performance and helps ensure that sales and marketing initiatives, operating practices, information technology resources, business decision, and people’s activities are aligned with business strategies to achieve desired business results and create shareholders value, (kennerly, Martinez, Mason, and Pietro, 2000: 37)
Approaches:
Dynamic and Stability Criteria Approach to Performance
Theorists identify the different approaches to performance. One approach to conceptualizing job performance is to view it as constantly changing rather than being stable (Ghiselli, 1956 in Sonnentag, and Frese, 2010: 119). This approach views job performance as somewhat unpredictable and dependent on many factors such as the job, individual mood, or other factors. This approach labels job performance as “dynamic criteria”. Change in performance can be attributed to many things, one of which is the acquisition of new skills on the job. This means that performance may alter with learning and development on a job, as observed by (Ghiselli (1956) in Sonnentag et al., 2010:118). On the other hand, if criteria are static, then it can be assumed that performance is stable over time. From the dynamic criteria viewpoint, certain predictors of an employee’s behavior, such as ability, may not be consistent throughout the employee’s tenure.
Sonnentag et al (2010:25) point out that it is one thing to conceptualize job performance as dynamic; it is another to measure or prove that it is dynamic. They highlight different approaches to showing that job performance is dynamic. Dynamic criteria can be shown by changes in a group’s average performance over time. For example, some researchers computed the average job performance for a group of employees over a period of years and examined the data for any fluctuations in the group’s mean performance. This approach is considered to be conceptually the weakest, as research does not distinguish between performance during a training period and continuous improvement over a period of time after the training. Another weakness of this approach is that average curves computed based on mean group performance do not reveal changes in individuals’ relative positions. Another group of theorists took another dimension through another approach to assessing whether or not job performance is dynamic or stable. This approach is by assessing individual level changes in the rank-ordering of their job performance scores over time. It involves a comparison of correlation coefficients computed between columns of job performance scores collected over time. For example, imagine a sample of 100 employees whose job performance is rated every week for one year. Each column of data represents job performance ratings for one week. In this approach, the correlation between Week one and Week two is compared to the correlation between Week one and Week three. All possible correlations are computed and compared. This process enables one to assess change in rank ordering over time. A finding that the correlations coefficients are relatively similar provides support for the stability of job performance, where a finding that the correlation coefficients fluctuate over time provides support for the notion that job performance is dynamic. Although researchers argue that this definition is the only one that directly addresses the assumption of stability of performance, this approach and the research conducted using this approach is not without its limitations. In several instances change over time was found (hence support for dynamic criteria). However, other factors such as restriction of range and temporal unreliability may also explain the results. Hence, researchers need to improve criterion measure reliability.
2.5 Empirical Review
This section reviews the works of other authors who have in their various studies explored related topics. The review is also done in line with the objectives.
Greenhalgh, and Rogers(2007) in their work, The Value of Intellectual Property Rights to Firms and Society, their empirical evidence concludes that the patent system provides clear incentives forinnovation in certain key, knowledge-intensive sectors. They studied 100 firms in Accra Ghana using direct interview on visitation to these organizations which include both small and medium scale industries.Their discovery also reveals that more generally, firms and industriesrespond to the presence of the patent system by making use of the system and in situations where management practice is optimal; they tailor their innovative strategies to the patent system. In this latter respect, benefits depend onthe use to which the patent is put, which can include obtaining freedom of action,commercializing own inventions, licensing them to third parties, entering into cross-licensingagreements and attracting external finance.
William(2008 : 18-25) did a study onEnforcing Small and Medium Firms with Patent Rights, for Entrepreneurs, Manufacturers and Small and Medium Enterprises; and produced an empirical data which show that manufacturing firms made up of small and medium-sized enterprises, represent over 90 %of businesses in most countries worldwide. They also typically account for a large share ofoverall employment, often over 60 %. On average, however, they are neither very dynamic, norvery productive nor innovative due to several factors which militate against them one of which is that they are not very active users of the intellectual propertysystem especially in the developing countries. This they conclude affects their rate of growth and development. On the other hand, firms that have exploited the use intellectual property system enjoy strong market share with consistent growth to the extent of the quality of their product and processes. This however applies mainly to small and medium industries rather than large ones. The study was done in South Africa using an on line survey method to draw question from various manufacturing firms. Over 120 organisations were studied.
Again, the most recent Science and Innovation Scoreboard published by the Organisation forEconomic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in (OECD Publishing Haley), Doc. No. 39(26) compares the innovation performance ofSmall and Medium firms to that of large firms across over 20 market economies. It shows that in all countries, small and medium firms on average are less likely than large firms tobring new products to the market thus affecting the development of creation and innovation in developing countries where these small firms are largely in operation. This holds for both product and process innovations.
William(2010: 32-35) in another research paper onInsider Intellectual Property Theft, studied 12 different companies interviewing at least 10 employees in each of the companies. He did this interview without the next person knowing about another’s interview. He reaches a final decision that intellectual property thieves are more often found in those who are working in technical positions. The majority of intellectual property theft is committed by current male employeesaveraging about 37 years of age who serve in mainly technical positions including engineers or scientists, managers,salespersons and programmers. These are people in the senior management cadre. Majority of whichhad signed intellectual property agreements. This indicates that policy alone withoutemployee comprehension and effective enforcement is ineffective. All these in his opinion are problems that can be minimized with strategic management of intellectual property. His discovery also reveals the following;
Typically insider intellectual property thieves already have a new job. About 65 percent of employees that commit insider intellectual property theft had already accepted positions with a competing company or started their own company at the time of the theft. About 25 percent were recruited by an outsider who had targeted the data and about 20 percent of thefts involved collaboration with another insider.
Insider intellectual property thieves most often steal what they have authorized access to. Subjects take the data they know, work with and often feel entitled to. In fact, 75 percent of insiders stole material they had authorized access to. This complicates an organization’s ability to protect their IP through technical controls and supports the need for more direct discussions with employees about what data is and is not transferrable upon their departure and should be an overt part of any employee IP agreement.
Trade secrets are most common intellectual property type stolen by insiders—Trade secrets were stolen in 52 percent of cases. Business information such as billing information, price lists and other administrative data was stolen in 30 percent, source code (20 percent), proprietary software (14 percent), customer information (12 percent), and business plans (6 percent). Insiders use technical means to steal intellectual property, but most theft is discovered by non-technical employees. The majority of subjects (54 percent) used a network, email, and a remote network access channel or network file transfer to remove their stolen data. However, most insider intellectual property theft was discovered by non-technical versus technical employees.
Source; Fisher W. (2000), Strategic Management of Intellectual Property: An Integrated Approach, US, Chicago University of Chicago Press, pg 47-53
Nwokocha (2012: 31) in studying theNigerian Intellectual Property: Overview of Developments & Practice, concludes thatthe need for an impressive development of intellectual property rights is however conditional on some factors being put in place and this includes: Proper review and amendment of intellectual property policies and laws in Nigeria; Provision and maintenance of basic infrastructure ; Financing of Research and Development (R&D) in our manufacturing industries and effective and efficient management by regular training of intellectual property personnel especially managers of industries to be up-to-date with international best practice. This she concludes is one of the only ways in which intellectual property can fulfill its mission in our economy. She did her study using 25 manufacturing companies in Lagos state and discovers that most of these firms do not even have an R & D department.
In another study conducted by Loofet al.(2001:17), on Protection of IP by Firms; they observe that in all sectors especially that sector with high technological potentials, firms are more inclined to protect their intellectual property especially firms that are into the production of products and processes that are protected by patents and trademarks. If they do not, they may lose their market position thus leading to the decline in growth of such firm. Loofet al(2001) used OECD and WTO data in addition to oral interviews directed to management staff of the firms they studied in doing their empirical work.
In their own paper on Intellectual Property, Issues, Rights and Obligations, Abo,Abah, and Danbaba(2010: 19) looked at the various policies on intellectual property in West African countries.They compared it with company’s policies on intellectual property to determine if it is drawn in line with their country’s policies. They conclude that the level of awareness of intellectualproperty in Nigeria is really at its low ebb. They recommend that government should establish and implement an intellectual property Policyin line with the global trend and make policies to enforce the practice in organizations. Secondly, organizations should be made to include in their policy the establishment of (R&D) department and the usage of strategic management to control the portfolio of their intellectual properties. thirdly, firms should make their policies in line with their country’s policy
Araba(2010:45) in his study onIntellectual Property Rights in Nigeria: Patent Issues and Benefits; concludesthat if there were no patent protections, copy rights protection and the use of Trademarks, there would be littleincentive to invent and innovatebecause once the details of aninvention became known, hoarders orimitators who did not share theinventor’s risks and expenses mightwell flood the market with copies ofthe product and reap much of thebenefits that should be accrued to theinventor. The study was done in university of Lagos using manufacturing firms in the North West Nigeria. The researcher also engaged with a disguised direct interview with marketers and other stake holders. Absence of Patent Protection he discovers will thereforediscourage research and development in manufacturing companies and in turn retard technologicalprogress of a country.
Smith (2008:9) studied the guide on intellectual management of asset for manufacturing companies in Liberia. He did the investigation at the national Research Institute in the country and started by assessing the level of awareness of manufacturing firms on the use of their intellectual property policy in relation to their business model. From data collected from 30 manufacturing companies, heconcludes that there is a need for manufacturing companies to look at their intellectual property policies in relation to their individual business models. This will enable them to set overall intellectual property strategies that optimise the benefits that can be gained from use of their intellectual property and to enhance knowledge transfer. Although the areas where policies are needed are the same across all organizations, it is the substance of these policies that differ from one organization to another. As business models of organizations differ, their intellectual property policies will also differ in order to extract maximum benefits from their intellectual property portfolios.
In another empirical investigation done by Nwokocha (2012:47-50) the challenges encountered in the manufacturing companies while faced with intellectual property issues were identified.The researcher drew a number of questionnaires to know the effect of these challenges on the industries. His findings reveals that these challenges pose enormous risks to captains of industry thereby deterring them from enjoying to the full capacity the usual benefits accruable by the use of intellectual property system.
A further empirical study was carried out by Nwokocha (2013: 66-70) where she investigated the Management and Control of Intellectual Property by manufacturing Industries as it affects the Nigerian Economy. The study was carried out in University of Maiduguri using 7 firms in the north central part of the country. Findings reveals as follows;
First, the administration of Intellectual Property Rights in Nigeria is incapacitated by inadequate skills and competence. Persons involved in its administration are usually not experts in managing portfolio of assets. There is acute shortage of manpower in the qualitative sense.
Secondly, the infrastructure for operation of Intellectual Property Rights in Nigeria is still largely undeveloped. Information Technology has not been fully developed and applied towards encouraging proper research by Intellectual Property experts, students and scholars. Filing of applications is always slow; the process of grant of Intellectual Property Rights could take years due to the limited infrastructural facilities especially at the Trade mark and Patent Registries. These cause enormous cost on organizations thus discouraging them from registering. These infrastructure deficiencies have not encouraged business development in Nigeria and with bottlenecks in passage of goods and services across borders in the region, including but not limited to inadequate electricity supply, inadequate communication system, poor road network and insufficient Information and Technology know-how.
Thirdly, Piracy and Counterfeiting have become an important factor frustrating business development in Nigeria. Nigeria is a big market with so much potential for growth. However, the country has not been able to achieve maximumpotential due to acts of piracy and counterfeiting and it has also remained a gateway to the rest of Africa for counterfeit products while fake goods are constantly being offered alongside genuine goods to consumers.
Fourthly, the penalty for offence of Intellectual Property Rights is not sufficient to deter would-be offenders. The only remedy for an owner is a civil action in court, leaving other more serious measures except in the area of copyright where the owner can institute a criminal action through the Nigerian Copyright Commission (NCC).
Fifthly, it is quite disappointing that after decades of independence, Nigeria has not made any significant change in its Intellectual Property laws, the laws have remained outdated.
In a similar study on Patents and Incentives to Innovate; some Theoretical and Empirical Economic Evidence; done by Belle(2000:14) in 9 industries in Belgium, data collected reveal that there are steps to use in achieving growth in our industries. One major step is to develop the micro-economic reasoning underlying the legal protection of intellectual property in general and the patent system in particular. Another step is to assess whether the legal protection of Intellectual Property does indeed fulfill the mission for which it has been created. He draws the conclusion that this mission would have been fulfilled to a very large extent if not for the poor management of intellectual property portfolio in most countries. He drew his conclusion from answers provided by innovators and personnel in R/D departments of industries on both direct and indirect interviews that he conducted. These answers all seem to indicate the same outcome.
Caillaud(2003) did a work on the use of Intellectual Property Tools to Maximize Industrial Growth. He investigated 7 manufacturing industries in Sydney Australia and comes to the conclusion that firms should use trade secrets for process innovation and business strategies for product innovation as a means of getting returns on their intellectual properties and enhancing their performance.
On the other hand, Anard, and Galetovic(2004) report survey result from their study on Intellectual Property Rights using the learning curve method shows that learning curves, sales or service efforts are substantially more effective in protection of IP than copyrights and other IP rights. They drew thisconclusion after carrying out a study on the Challenges Posed by Protection of Intangible Assets in our Industries. This seems to deviate from the conclusion of most other authors on the issue.
Similarly, Henkel, and Pangerl, (2008) did a study on Defensive Publishing; an Empirical Review. The researchers developed a game theoretical model which compares the options of patenting, secrecy and defensive publishing. They conducted a total of 56 semi structured – interviews between April and November 2008, part over the phone, part face to face. Their finding predicts that defensive publishing will be preferred when an invention is easy to invent around.
Another empirical study conducted by Zang, (2009: 78-83) on the influence of intellectual property risks to knowledge protection and innovation performance was done in Xian University China.10 firms were studied and he came to a conclusion that Intellectual Property Risks encountered by firms has a negative relationship with innovative performance. On the other hand, decrease in IP risks thus increases innovation and performance. Intellectual property risks are the possible event that will bring disadvantageous influences to the current or the latent rights and interests of the owner of IP.
Noble,(2007) in his own study, did an empirical work on the Roles of IPR for Innovation; a Review of the Empirical Evidence and Implications for Developing Countries. The study was done at Humbold University in Berlin using data from 60 countries. In his work, one of the major objectives is to assess the impacts of patents and Trade Mark on innovation in industrialized and developing countries. Furthermore, another interesting objective is to provide policy advice on innovation and other IP policies. In his findings, he concludes that developing countries need to implore more appropriate intellectual property policies to support innovation. His findings also reveal that even where the policies seem to be appropriate, poor management of these properties poses another problem. He then recommends among other recommendations that strategic management be adopted in IP administration just like in the physical properties.The domestic legal system directly affects the enforcement of the rights which comes up after violation. However, violation can be highly minimized if these properties are strategically, effectively and appropriately managed. Corporate managers should therefore be involved in the management of intellectual property.
Encaua and Antonet (2006: 71-79) worked on Intellectual Property Use; Choice between Patents and Secrecy. The study was carried out in Ecuador. They did an extensive literature on companies’ decision to patent. Their interest lies in reviewing the available evidence on whether intellectual property protection and acquisition should form part of the framework of manufacturing firms and whether intellectual property system encourages innovation. They used survey research design to study 50 different companies with more than 2500 employees. The study lasted for a period of 3years. Respondents were asked to indicate the importance of the various methods of intellectual property protection to their company with Likert scale answers ranging from Low, to Medium, and then High. Their findings reveal that protection of properties of intellect should be a very essential part of an organization.However, trade secrets are found to be a more important way to protect intellectual property than patents. Nevertheless, patents should be employed in addition to trade secrets to achieve maximum protection. This again largely depends on the type of activity being carried out by the firm, the size of the firm and the type of intellectual property being protected.
Shaw, and Stoch, (2006) worked on the Behavioral Indicator of Malicious Insider Theft of Intellectual Property. The research was carried on at the University of Tulsa US. They addressed the high level of organizational anxiety regarding potential theft of sensitive, proprietary, intellectual property or similar critical data by insiders of the corporations. They developed a four conceptual category model that is deployed to evaluate employee risk and identify characteristics of these employees that can be manipulated to reduce this risk because they believe that addressing certain issues in employee work characteristics may reduce the need to steal in order to get even. Under this model, subjects are also viewed through the overlapping variables with the four conceptual categories. Their discovery reveals that many organizations lose their sensitive information through efforts of targeted, disloyal, discontented, disgruntled and unhappy employees for example the popular Wiki Leak in (2010). Trade secrets are also one of the most frequently intellectual property type stolen by insiders. They recommended amongst other things for firms to engage in activities that will encourage employees. Such things like risk reduction strategies and human resource management strategies that may reduce the need to steal in order to get even which is apparent in some disgruntled employees. They also emphasized the need to re- examine and review IP policies especially as regards to its management. Simple existence of a policy alone without employee comprehension and effective management and enforcement will lead to ineffectiveness which will have a negative influence on the general performance of the organization.
Fisher, and Oberholzer, (2013) did an empirical work on the strategic management of Intellectual Property; an Integrated Approach. The study was done in California. They studied 100 firms using both structured and unstructured questionnaire to illicit information from respondents. They also used a map to develop an IP framework which was eventually used to compare with the data representing the true picture. They focused on new practices, strategies, and business models that will be used in order to ensure that intellectual property will attract the benefits it should like value creation and exploitation, and exertion of market power. Their findings reveal that there is common view that IP portfolios bear few strategic consequences. This has led to the separation of intellectual property portfolio management and strategic management by many manufacturing companies. Secondly, firms lack integrated approach to the acquisition and management of IP which otherwise will raise their market value and close up competitors and possible violation. Further discovery reveal that even when companies perceive the need for integrated approach to managing IP and setting strategies, the dialogue between the legal section and the business executives is often difficult. They lack a common framework to develop an approach to IP that is broad in its outlook and integrated with the strategic management.
Rogers, Bronwyn, Helmers, and Vernia, (2013)also studied the Tradeoff between using IP protection and other means of protection.Their objective is to assess the popular believe by most people that patents, trademarks and others may not necessarily protect a company’s most valuable invention and that they are less protective than other informal ways like lead time and confidential agreement. The study was done using a survey research design on firms. They structured online forms and got a response from 367 different firms consisting of small, medium and large firms in different parts of the world. Their location was Pennsylvania, US. The evidence available from their conclusion suggests that an average firm rely more on informal than formal IP protection especially in developing countries and amongst small firms. They also discovered that some firms in these countries don’t even protect their IP at all. This has led to a high level of violation by intruders thereby affecting the benefits that these firms should have been enjoying from these protections. They enlisted such benefits as; increased profitability, sustainability, long term viability of the organization, increased market share, and increase in innovative activities. On the other hand, firms in developed countries use both formal and informal means to protect their IP. A lot will however depend on the types of product that they are manufacturing.
Another interesting study was done by Akester, (2009) on the topic Intellectual Property Watch; Impact of Digital Rights Management on ability of users to take advantage of certain exceptions to Copyright. Location was Cambridge University UK.One of Akester’s major objectives was to look at the way information products are being disseminated. She raised questions as to whether those values remain compatible with new modes of information dissemination. The researcher adopted both survey and descriptive research designexamining how the issue is working in practice based on series of interviews with key organizations and individuals involved in the use of copyright materials. The researcher in her findings discovers that, Digital Rights Technology (DRM) has been a failure because it never stopped an experienced and determined Launcher from cracking the DRM or copying, moving or altering the protected content. It thus made the pirated version more valuable even if quality was slightly reduced. That is why MP files can work in any portable device. The conclusion therefore is that media industries should reconsider some of their policies pertaining IP and this should be included as part of strategic plan of the companies. It should also be discussed in forums like WTO, WIPO etc. Secondly, to maintain their market against imitation, property rights will not only be acquired, but also be managed properly.
Ghazinory, Abedi, and Mashari, (2011) also worked on Intellectual Property Protection. Their study was on a Model for IP Protection based on an Empirical Study of Iranian Nano Technology companies. The study was carried out in Iran where they did an examination of innovation preservation practice in 45 existing companies in the area of Nano Technology protection in Iran. The researchers developed three steps mode in the study which are all directed to the strategic protection of IP in Nano Technology companies.Firstly, they identified and classified the factors affecting existing innovation preserving system and other necessary criteria in these companies. Secondly, they identified the indices and grouped them into three classes of Organisation, Environmental and Innovation characteristics. Thirdly, they did a qualitative study on the various businesses carried out by those Nano companies. Finally, a decision making Matrix is proposed by the authors based on two indices; size of the firm or financial power and organizational learning curve. Their findings reveal that manufacturers do not use any specific mechanism to protect their intellectual property. Out of the 45 companies studied, only 9 acquired the appropriate mechanism to protect intellectual property rights that are relevant to the type of products they are offering, their environment and the type of technology they use. They therefore recommend that certain indices must be considered inclusive but not limited to organizational policies as it affects intellectual property Management, Industrial Structure, Organisational Characteristics and Type of Property being protected.
Holgerson, (2011) did another work in Sweden on Patent Management; a Literature Review and an Empirical Study of Appropriation, Propensity and Motives. 5 firms were studied using survey design. The researcher adopted a semi- structured interview to allow for flexibility, open discussions and new ideas. The researcher focuses on small and medium enterprises and did an insight into how patenting is used in Research and Development management of entrepreneurial SME firms. The interview were structured along four themes; importance and role of patenting to firms;competence and resources management for patenting in the firms;motive for patenting and reasons not to patent in the firm; and finally potential benefit of patenting in the firm. Findings reveal that patents are more effective in certain industries like the pharmaceuticals while in others, patenting is of little or no importance to firms. These other firms however need to acquire other types of rights for protection of their inventions and creations.The findings further reveal that there is a high degree of benefits accruable to it if it is used in the relevant industries and at the appropriate manner which helps industries to not only secure their market share, but also retain the strength of their product in the market.
Grant, (2010) did a work in France on Intellectual Property Activity in Bankrupt Technology Firms; an Empirical and Case Based Study. Grant was interested in determining the perceived value of Patents, Trademarks and Copyrights in the context of bankruptcy technology firms. He analyzed the intellectual property portfolios of 100 firms with the purpose of developing a better understanding of the management of intellectual property in times of distress. In addition, the researcher interviewed many scholars in the field while doing the analysis. The result is that there is no clear prescription for efficient management of intellectual property in these industries studied. However, a good number of firms extract value from their IP. The result also suggests that there is a strong positive relationship between IP protection and economic and or corporate success such as growth, enterprise profitability, shareholders return, strong control of the market and more innovation. His discovery also reveals that there are benefits associated to IP acquisition and management. This must be considered to determine which option is most appropriate for the IP owner.
Gassman, Ziegler, Ruther, and Bader, (2012:36-48) studied The Role of Information Technology for Managing Intellectual Property. The study was done in University of Melbourne Australia at the IP Research Institute. In their study, the researcher observe that information technology tools are means to support the management of IP portfolios but there is little insight on how firms actually make use of these tools. They therefore focused on how and for which processes firms use information technology tools to support their intellectual property management as a part of strategic management of these intangible assets. Their approach adopted a research which consisted of two phases. They started by conducting a worldwide on – line questionnaire survey to obtain a broad picture of how firms use IT tools within IP management. A total of 1210 IP intensive firms were contacted out of which 906 usable questionnaire were received. Case studies were then conducted on the firms that provided the most detailed and insightful information. Data were also primarily collected through semi-structured and face to face interviews with IP and R&D managers. In addition, the researchers did a desk research of firm reports on firms that responded from various parts of the world. Public announcement was also conducted for triangulation and to increase the robustness of the results. Analysis of the data results to the fact that firms use at least one of three major IT tools for IP management. These are; Search Tools, Evaluation Tools and Administrative Tools. Secondly, firms use this in the early IP generation phase to absorb technological development but later retards as time goes on. This is largely because of the cost and it eventually affects them negatively. Secondly, they reveal that various types of rights acquired by firms fulfill various mission according to the purpose for which these rights are acquired. Firms that acquire the relevant property rights with efficient and effective usage usually will benefit to a large extent despite the difficulties that they may have encountered in the process. They recommend that an outline of how and where IT tools can improve the management of IP should be developed.They also recommend that firms should consider the fact that IT tools may facilitate their access to information which can be useful to improve strategy. Finally, a more proactive management of IP portfolios and the use of IT tools will efficiently leverage intellectual property management for optimal benefit.
Kalanje (2002), in studying the topic; Enhancing the Competitiveness and Growth of SMEs: Intellectual Property for SMEs, did an empirical study on 20 small scale enterprises that are IP compliance. These companies have an R&D department in their firms. One of his objectives was to ascertain the effect of strategic IP management on the performance of firms. His discovery shows that these firms are able to improve the performance of their products in the market place with the use of intellectual property protection especially Patents, Trade Secretes and Trade Marks. The finding also reveals that due to inadequate IP awareness, most SMEs do not consider their IP assets as independent assets with independent value and in most cases they treat them as goodwill while in other cases they don’t consider them at all. This results to the underestimation of the total value of the enterprise, loss of market share, profitabilit5y and at times even firms liquidation. Finally, his findings reveal that brands facilitate market intelligence and increases market share. His conclusion also declares that generally speaking, all IP assets have the potential of facilitating entry into foreign markets. Copyrights, trademarks, patents, industrial designs and geographical indication can all be used to enhance export opportunities. He however recommends that for a company to be successful in such venture and for it to make effective use of intellectual property, it must put in place IP management mechanism within its enterprise.
Obidike, (2000) did an empirical work on, Intellectual Property Management Strategy: Challenges and Return from Investment in Manufacturing Firms in Lagos State. He studied 50 manufacturing firms in Lagos. He used both descriptive and survey research design. He did an insight into the experience of IP specialists, the challenges they encounter and how they overcome these challenges for efficient and productive IP operations.His findings reveal that oftentimes, IP is underestimated and does not get the attention it should. He also discovered that IP is usually not identified, captured, protected and/or kept under regular review. Secondly, those firms that invest on IP do not gain the best return from their investment in IP largely because they do not have the insight and experience of IP specialists which can help to overcome the challenges of efficient and productive IP operations. Managing IP effectively should therefore involvea wide range of factors such as showing value on the balance sheet, defending a market position, asserting rights, preparing a portfolio to trade, structuring, preparing for growing future revenue in order to increase the benefits accruable to it. Other proprietary approaches involving systems, databases, procedures, benchmarking and reporting tools to aid IP management and help you achieve these goals were also recommended by the researcher.
Erik, Lorin, and Shinkyu, (2011) studied the Impact of Intellectual Property in the Business Performance of Technology Based Firms
The data set used for this analysis and valuation is got from 1000 firms over a ten years period of the 2000–2010periods, and they matched it to a cross-sectional survey of organizational practices conducted. A brief description of each data source follows;IP spending by site for 1000 companies. Data from approximately 25,000 sites were aggregated to form the measures for the1,000 companies that represent the total population in any given year. This database is compiled from telephone surveys that gather detailed information about the ownership of IP rights. Most sites are updated at least annually, with more frequent sampling for larger sites. The year-end state of the database for each year from 2000 to 2010 was used for the measures.From these data they obtained the total IP registered for that period by the various companies. They also noted the performance of these companies and their management techniques. The organizational management practices derived from a series of surveys of large firms. These surveys adapted questions from previous surveys on management and control of human resource practices, IP control and organisational performance. The questions address the allocation of various types of decisionmaking authority, the use of IP rights, the individuals involved in its control and the effect it has on the profitability and market control of their products, and other miscellaneous characteristics of manufacturing industries Organizational data were collected at the end of the period. This yielded a cross section of 416 firms, with a survey response rate of 49.7 per cent. They also detected no significant pattern of response bias when the sample from different firms was compared with each other. Of the 416 firms that responded to the survey in some way, data for a total of 272 was again collected. The analysis concludes that firms that engaged in IP acquisition with effective management have the tendency to sustain their products and processes with less interference on their IP.
In a similar study conducted in Calabar by Esien(2000), on the performance of firms by improving the patent system to promote innovation and firm performance, theyperformed a regression and correlation analyses to test their fivehypotheses. First, they explored the basic relationship between IP and market share for full sample of 45 firms. They then used correlationanalyses to examine the relationship between IP capital and theadoption of specific organizational management practices, andconstructed a singlevariable to capture a portion of the relevant variation in organizationacross the firms. The variable was used to represent their measureof organizational IP capital. Third, they also investigated the effect of using IP control toolson firm market share, and performance. Fourth, they studied how the combination of these toolsaffects the firm’s productivity and performance as regard their profitability and sustainability. Finally, they examined how these variablesaffect output in a production function framework. They also performed anumber of checks on the robustness of their analysis and considered alternativehypotheses. Their findings; there is a positive relationship between IP and market share; the combination of certain IP rights, trade mark and trade secret for example results to increase in profitability and the general performance of an industry; effective use of patents encourages creativity and innovation thereby having a positive effect on firm performance.
Igbokwe,et al, (2007) studied the Ideology and Exceptionalism in Intellectual Property and began by replicating earlier work by Brynjolfssonand Yang, (1997) with a slightly larger data set. The study was done over a ten years period. They used tables to report results ofregression analyses examining the relationship between Trade mark, performance, innovation andmarket share. This equation relates market share to the three types of intellectualassets identified which are patents, trade mark, and trade secret. They pooled multiple firms in multiple years and includeddummy variables for each year. With theexception of regressions, and using least absolute deviation (LAD) techniques and the use of Huber-White robust standard errors or random-effectsmodels to account for multiple observations of the same firm over time, the LAD regressions, being nonlinear regression procedures, do not have analogous panel data corrections. Therefore the standard errors for analyses using these procedures may be understated by as much as a factor of 3.3 (the square root of the number of time-series observations), although in practice the error is well below this bound.
They also included measures of firms’ R&D-sales and advertising-salesratios. The ordinary least squares OLS regression report findsthat each of the IP tools has value added to the firms somewhatlarger than the theoretical value that would be expected if there wereno IP tools acquired by these companies. The market value of firms using this increased over time. Thecost of the acquisition of IP tools or correlated intangible assets even though quite high, the benefits accruable at the end of the day is still worth the effort.
Robert, et al (2000) in studying the Economics of IP Managementtook an insight into 70 firms in the central city of Paris.They looked at the stock valuations of the various firms by isolating their IP capital and then doing a total valuation of both tangible and intangible assets. The total valuation seems to be blown up. This apparent excess valuation of their stocks suggests the presence of substantial intangible assets, orother omitted components of market value correlated with intellectual assets. The components of marketvalue that are unique to time period and industry were also considered. The investmentflows for the firms in thesample; their analysis also suggeststhat certain types of organizational practices are likely to have a significant influence on the value of intangible assets.
The table analysis suggest that, in equations usingshort (one- and two-year) differences, changes in intellectual asset levelsappear to have no significant correlation with changes in market share, profitability and productivitywhereas in equations with longer differences the relationship is positively substantial.The coefficients rise from essentially zero for one-year differencesto around 10 for five-year differences, and stabilize beyond that.
Jorgenson, And Fraumeni, (2011) found that the stock of human capital in the U.S. economy dwarfs that of physical capital and has grown markedly over time. This can be related to the Nigerian situation especially the South East Nigeria with its readily available and rich human resources. Their findings also revealed that both in the developed and developing economies, production requires not only such traditional factors as capital and labour but also skills, organizational structures and processes, culture, and all the intangible assets and other factors collectively referred to as “Intellectual Properties.” However, a lot will depend on the control and management of these properties for it to be able to serve the purpose for which it was acquired. They did an empirical study on the effect of Patents, Trademarks and Copy rights on the Creation of new Market and Performance of industries. The study was done in US using case studies of twenty five different companies located in the state of New York. They employed the use of survey methods to document a relationship between use of these rights on some aspects of organizational change, such as new business processes, greater demand for their products, increased market share, and performance of the firms in terms of productivity, profitability and sustainability. They employed the use of detailed investigation of some of these types of intellectual asset and found that they are often large in magnitude and have important productivity benefits which lead to improved performance.
Nnabuike (2000) studied the Economics of IP management and its effect on research and development of manufacturing companies. He used the survey method and analysed his data using both chi square and correlation coefficient and found evidence that research and development (R&D) assets bring benefits in the form of positive marginal product, profitability, and rise in both market valuation and market share. He concludes that the benefits accruable by the use of IP and IP tools when effectively managed is very high when compared to the cost of acquisition of these rights and the cost of maintaining a research and development department especially in certain industries. To realize the potential benefits of IP however, investments in additional “assets” such as new organizational processes and structures, worker knowledge, and redesigned monitoring, reporting, and incentive systems is needed. Secondly, protection of the properties of intellect is also needed before the full benefits of the properties are realised. In some cases the cost of control and protection of these properties and implementing the new processes, training, and incentive systems may be many times greater than the cost of the new technology or innovation itself. However, the managers who decide to incur these costs presumably expect the present value of the resulting benefits to be no less than these costs, even if they accrue over a period of years and are uncertain. In this sense managers’ behaviour and style of management plus companies policy plays a major role which eventually reflects their belief that they are investing in an economic asset.
In an empirical research on Leveraging the International Economy of IP and Driving Performance; a Growth Theory which was done by Bresnahan, T. and Hitt (1999), they found that organizational practices like proper control of intellectual properties, use of IP tools like trademark, trade secret and patents, and strategic management of IP rights when combined with investments in information technology (IT), were associated with significant increases in performance in the late 1990s and early 2000. Investors also attempt to incorporate intellectual properties into their valuation of firms, and this is one reason that the market share and market value of a firm may differ markedly from that of a firm that does not use these IP tools. Collectively, this research argues for complementarities between IP investment and other organizational investment, and specifically a relationship between use of IP and greater decentralization of certain decision as regards IP rights, and productivity and performance of organisations. The study was done in whindhouke Namibia and one hundred and ten (110) manufacturing firms were studied over a 10 year period. An on line questionnaire was used to consistently collect information from these firms. The researcher also visited 47 of the companies located within the north of windhouke and interviewed the relevant personnel’s in the firms. Case studies were used and a growing body of statistical analyses done led to the discovery that the use of IP rights encourages innovation which in turn drives performance to a higher level. Inclusive of their findings is the fact that assets that are intangible need not be invisible. In particular, the market value of a firm that has leveraged intellectual assets with organizational IP rights should be substantially greater than that of a similar firm that has not. An IP that is protected with rights and integrated with complementary organizational assets should be significantly more valuable to a business than an IP put away in a box without such protection. Their conclusion is thus that firms that choose to invest in certain business models, organizational practices, and corporate cultures that promote the use of intellectual property rights are more susceptible to perform better than their counterparts in same production line that do not have such culture. Later some of these investments may be costly but at the end they turn out to be more productive and profitable leading to the conclusion that IP rights are very useful in the growth of a firm.
Ononikpo and Uzodiaku, (2005) empirically analyzed data on Intellectual Property, Organizational practices, and Performance from over 30 large firms and discover that intellectual property use is also correlated with a pattern of work organization involving more decentralized decision making amongst managers and policy makers, intellectual property policy statement and then greater use of management personnel’s in the control of the assets. Their findings also indicate that increases in firms’ IP capital stock are associated with the greatest increases in output in firms that also have high levels of human capital with intellectual property policies and decentralised decision making. However, firms that implement only one complement without the others often performs less than firms which implement none at all. The study geographical location covered the South East Nigeria. A total of 1200 questionnaires were distributed to illicit information from respondents out of which 800 was collected and analysed. Partial correlation coefficient and multiple regression analysis were used to analyse the collected data.
Moutou, and Ezeilo (2007) in their own study on Improving Patent Quality through the Administrative Process believe that the presence of intangible organizational assets can be observed in at least three ways. First, some of the specific changes that firms make may be directly observable. They visited the firms manufacturing operations and got some insight into the effort of these firms in creating various kinds of intellectual assets and protection methods and the resulting productivity implications. Second, the effect of these changes on a firm’s market valuation should be measurable. Third, these intellectual assets when and if properly managed should provide real returns in the form of higher output. Thus a production function framework should reveal that firms that have put in place more of these intangibles saw greater output in subsequent years. They focused on the relationship between intellectual properties and market growth of each firm and the administrative procedures used to manage these properties. The study was done covering four states of the South South Nigeria of Rivers state, Bayelsa state, Cross River state and Akwa Ibom State. The researchers adopted the use of questionnaires for primary data collection and also structured on- line questions. Just as investors can visit various factories and buildings owned by a firm and attempt to judge their profit-making potential, they can also form their own judgments about the existence, relevance, and value of various intangible assets owned or controlled by the firm. One difference, however, is that firms do not report a value for many of the intangible assets on their balance sheets, forcing investors to rely on other sources of information to value these assets. As a result, investors and analysts appear to devote relatively more time and effort to assessing the value of companies with larger stocks of intangible. The test of five hypotheses revealed that firms that use intellectual property rights have the potential to experienced higher market growth, have the potential to make more profit, and the tendency for increase in the market value of the firm.
Another study that was conducted covering a geographical area of the state of Illinois by a team of three researchers of IP suggests that many, perhaps most, efforts at organizational change fail, and projects involving extensive investments in IP often fall well short of expectations. Ex ante, a rational manager must consider the substantial risk of failure before deciding whether acquisition of such rights is beneficial to the firm and the type to acquire which is likely to deliver the required protection and returns on investment. In the traditional interpretation, when a high rate of performance is found to be associated with IP, it requires the adjustment costs of investing more in IP. In their interpretation, however, relatively little of the performance level is due to this effect. They conclude that most of the value that springs from intangible assets, including other benefits such as sustainability, and profitability in business organization are mostly achieved when the use of IP is complemented with other business strategies especially in IP-intensive firms. The work was done by (Kingston, Kitching, and Blackburn, 2004) on the topic, Proliferating Intellectual Property Rights; a Survey of Trade Secret, Trade Mark and Patent Investigation. At the end of the sample period, they observed that the business organization was a winning model; at the beginning of the period, and that as the organization was using the protection more and more, its value was much more obvious. The research leads them to five hypotheses, which are empirically testable. These hypotheses are;
• Investments in Trade Mark, Trade Secret and Patents should be correlated with increased Strategic management of Trade Mark, Trade Secret and Patents.
• If these properties represent part of the productive assets of a firm, they should also be associated with increases in market value, market growth and market share.
• If intangible assets are mostly created in firms that practice the use of IP rights, those firms should have a value accruing from the use of these IP rights that should be higher than the cost involved in the acquisition.
• Any intellectual assets correlated with strategic management and high level of control should also result in higher measured output of the firm in subsequent years, reflecting the returns to these intellectual assets.
• Firms that are intensive IP users are also more likely to adopt work practices that involve a specific cluster of organizational characteristics, including greater use of teams, broader distribution of certain decision rights, and increased worker training.
The researchers collected data from 1,200 large firms over eleven years (1999–2009). Their sample also consists predominantly of large, established firms with high-technology stocks. Their finding results are qualitatively similar for each individual year when estimated separately over their eleven-year sample period, which includes the peak and trough of a business cycle. This argues against the possibility that their results are simply driven by short-term stock market fluctuations. Taken together, they discovered that their results lend quantitative and qualitative support to the idea that IP is most valuable when coupled with IP rights and effective management and control. They found evidence supporting all five hypotheses.
Akpotaire (2011) empirically examined the Recent Developments in Intellectual Property in Nigeria; and suggests that small and medium size enterprises often reflect the idiosyncrasies of the individuals involved and the relationships they foster in their intangible assets. Such assets are, therefore, inherently fragile. The researcher investigated 7 manufacturing firms in Lagos and looked at the structural capitals of these firms. She adopted the use of questionnaires in collecting primary data from respondents and structured interview on the managerial cadre of the firms under study. Her findings reveals that of course, ‘structural capital’ (such as intellectual property), is also of importance, with some SMEs protecting their intangible assets with copyrights, trademarks, patents, etc. Indeed, particularly for the more research-intensive SMEs and technology based small and medium firms, the use of patents can be crucial in obtaining venture capital. However, in general, their research also shows that some SMEs tend to avoid using the IP system and often see it as counterproductive This is likely due, not so much to a lack of ideas and potential patents, but to the high costs and administrative burden of the IP process. Moreover, the informal nature of many SMEs puts them at odds with the formality of the IP system. Most SMEs therefore protect their intangible assets not through the IP system but through informal methods such as developing high-trust relationships or maintaining lead-time advantages. Moreover, intangible assets that provide the firm with a competitive technological edge tend to be protected through further technological investments in order to maintain competitive advantage.
Clarke, Seng, and Whiting (2004), did an empirical investigation on Intellectual Property and Firm Performance in Australia.
The study examines the effect intellectual property (IP) has on firm performance using a sample of Australian companies listed between 2004 and 2008. Data are collected for Australian publicly listed firms through an online filling of forms and questionnaires designed to address the problem under investigation. The period of study was between 2004 and 2008 and they analysed the data using regression and ANOVA. IP is measured using Pulic’s Value Added Intellectual Coefficient (PVAIC) and its components and both a direct and a moderating relationship between VAIC and performance are analysed. They noted that prior PVAIC studies have also investigated the direct relationship between IP and performance, but not a moderating effect of firm’s IP on the relationship between tangible assets and firm performance. Their result suggest that there is a direct relationship between IP and performance of Australian publicly listed firms, particularly when properties are employed efficiently and to a lesser extent with human capital efficiency. A positive relationship between IP (especially trade mark and patents) in the prior year and performance in the current year is also found. Evidence also suggests the possibility of a moderating relationship between IP and physical and financial capital which impacts positively on firm performance.
Willoughby (2013), studied the Impact Intellectual Property has on the Business Performance of Technology Firms. The empirical study of the relationship between intellectual property and the performance of technology firms in the bioscience-technology industries was carried out in Sydney where he investigated 9 firms. The study found a statistically significant positive relationship between the firm’s investments in intellectual property and their performance. The performance measure was based upon revenue-growth data collected from each firm, and the categories of intellectual property analysed included patents, trade secrets, trademarks, copyright and licenses to externally sourced technology. The study also found that the financial benefits of accumulating a strong intellectual property portfolio were enjoyed by technology firms regardless of whether they were strategically oriented towards R&D or strategically oriented towards the commercial production of products and services.
Mahmoud and Ismail (2009) carried out a research on Intellectual Property in Malaysia under Performance. They sought to investigate the efficacy of intellectual property and its effect on a company's performance .They used the data collected from 18 active companies in the manufacturing sector in 2007. The data was collected using questionnaires. In their work, the dependent variable is the company's performance which they measured using the criteria of return on investment, return on asset and return on equity. They obtained the ROI, ROA and ROE by dividing the net profit by total investment, total asset and net profit by total owner’s equity respectively. The ratio indicates the efficacy of their investment choice, the use of assets and that of the common owner’s equity which shows the profit of the firm for each owner’s equity, each asset and each investment for the period studied. On the other hand, they measured the independent variable which is the intellectual property by finding the difference between the market value and ledger value of the firms. This method of calculating IP was popularized by (Edwinson and Malon 1997).
To calculate IP value, the following relation was used;
IP = market value of a firm minus its ledger value. The interpretation of the result will depend on the value derived from the subtraction.
If IP is lower than zero, intellectual property value of the company will be negative.
If IP is higher than zero, the intellectual property value of the firm will be positive.
And if IP is equal to zero, it means that the firm has no intellectual property value.
The analysis of the research hypotheses indicates that the manufacturing sector relies more on intellectual property when compared to other service industries like insurance firms. They also found that there is a positive, significant relationship between the intellectual property and the company's performance (measured by ROA, ROI, ROE, and Profitability)
Kumath (2008) selected 7 active firms in India small and medium size industries for research, and studied the relationship between the intellectual property and company's performance with a sample size of 746 out of a population study of 1249 personnel. He intended to determine the relationship between the different components of intellectual property rights and the company's performance based on the traditional criteria including profitability, market value, market share, output, and productivity of companies. The research hypotheses tests were carried on using correlation coefficient which indicates the intensity of the relationship between dependent and independent variable. Descriptive statistics and tables were used to present the data collected through questionnaires and oral interviews. His findings indicate that there is a strong positive relationship between IP and all the criteria except in small scale industries. This is mainly because of the heavy cost involved in the use of IP which would usually deplete their profit.
In (2008) Gen, and Saleh, carried out a research into Intellectual Property and Company's Performance in Malaysia. They drew on correlation and regression studying 25 manufacturing firms from different parts of the country. Structured on line questionnaire was used to collect data from the firms under study. The result show that companies continued to rely much on their physical property and that the efficacy of intellectual property is still the main effective variable in the profitability of a firm whereas human resource is of great importance in the improvement and increase in its productivity. Finally, the results showed that the value of intellectual property could account for the profitability and productivity of a firm but it couldn't explain the market share.
Following his study to evaluate the relationship between the intellectual property and performance indices, Penyetal (2007) concludes that intellectual property components affect the performance of companies. The research was carried out in Manchester Uk. Penyetal used each of the performance indices to relate to intellectual property.
Ton et al (2007) investigated 150 active firms in Singapore from 2000 to 2005 and looked into the Specific Relationship between the Intellectual Property and Financial Yield. They used the value added coefficient of intellectual property, (VACI) to evaluate its effect on the yield ratio of owner's equity and each share’s profit, and the annual yield of shares. The results showed that;
a) There is a positive, significant relationship between the intellectual property and company's performance
b) There is a positive relationship between the intellectual property and future performance of a company and
c) There is a positive, significant relationship between the growth rate of intellectual property and the future performance of a company.
Jean et al (2006) investigated the Intellectual Property and the Performance of Institutes in China. They also used the value added coefficient model of intellectual property to calculate capital generated through intellectual property. They then considered the relationship between intellectual property and company's performance, and found that intellectual property has a very important effect on company's performance.
Yang (2006) investigated the Relationship between Intellectual Property Components and Value Accruable to it. They conclude that;
1. There is a positive, significant relationship between the intellectual property components (elements) and company's performance because the market value of the firm increased through the increase from IP usage.
2. Increase in intellectual property is dependent on the process of value creation and its strategic accumulation in organizations.
Chen et al (2005) considered the relationship between intellectual property value coefficient and performance to companies in Taiwan ,during the period from 1999-2002 They drew on four criteria to measure performance and the results show that there is a positive significant relationship between intellectual property components (elements)and performance
Riahibalkui (2003) investigated the effect of intellectual capital on company's performance using the number of requests for the maintenance of trade marks by companies. The criterion for the measurement of company's performance was the ratio of added value to the total assets. The period under study covered the years from 1992 to 1996 for 81 active firms in the United States. The hypothesis analysis showed that there is a positive, significant relationship between the intellectual capital and company's performance.
Abbasi and Sadeghi (2010) considered the effect of Intellectual Property indices including the efficacy of Human, Physical, and Structural Capitals on the financial performance of companies (dividend, the yield rate of owner's equity and the annual yield rate) for 99 companies from 2000-2003. The intellectual capital is accumulated as a result of intellectual property. To answer the research questions, they developed two main hypotheses which were both tested on all the company's in the research population. The hypotheses were formulated as follows:
Hypothesis 1: There is a significant relationship between the intellectual capital and the yield of the owner's equity
Hypothesis 2: There is a significant relationship between the intellectual capital and the yield rate of assets.
The result showed that companies with higher and stronger intellectual capital enjoy better financial performance.
Madhoushi and Nejad (2009) measured the Intellectual Property, and considered its relationship with the financial yield of companies. They first calculated the intellectual property of the companies under study in the six-year-long period from 2001 to 2006.They then evaluated the intellectual property value and the financial yield. Randomized sampling was used by the researcher and 58companies were selected from the research sample. The findings suggest a positive, significant relationship between the intellectual property and financial yield, and the future financial yield, and the growth rate of the oncoming financial yield of companies.
Not all the investigations support the positive significant relationship between intellectual property and company's performance. (Favour and Williams (2003), Shiv(2006), and chan (2009) all found that human and intellectual properties have a negative effect on the ratio between the assets flow and value of the company thus reducing performance level. This effect shows that use of intellectual property and the resources it demands has led to the weakening of company's performance.
Greenhalgh, and Rogers (2010) did a work on Trademarks and Performance in Services and Manufacturing Firms: Evidence of Schumpeterian Competition through Innovation. In their work, they developed the Lancaster model of consumer behaviour under product differentiation as a framework for the analysis of Schumpeterian competition and creative destruction. The model predicts that launching new products with novel combinations of characteristics enables firms’ to temporarily steal market share from rivals. The launch of new products was monitored empirically using the registration of new trademarks. For this empirical analysis they constructed a data set for a large sample of UK service sector and manufacturing firms and then began by investigating whether trademark activity by the firm is linked to its profitability and productivity as predicted by the model. Analysis of Tobin’s model indicates that stock market values are positively associated with trademark activity, with Community trademarks attracting higher premiums than UK marks. They also investigated the relationship between trademark activity and output, finding firms that are trademark active achieve significantly higher value added than non-trade markers. Finally, the last section of the study examines interactions between firms, via trademark activity within product groups, to explore the nature of what they called creative destruction. In the short run, greater trademark activity by other firms in its group reduces the value added of the firm. However this same competitive pressure tends to raise its productivity growth and stock market value. Their findings reveal that trade mark strongly correlates with performance but in the short run it negatively affects profit margin. This is consistent with the Schumpeterian process of competition through innovation, restraining profit margins in the short term while increasing product quality and variety in the medium term.
2.6 Nigeria; South East Nigeria
Nigeria, officially known as the Federal Republic of Nigeria is a West African country. It is surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean, Benin and Cameroun respectively. It has a land Area of 910,770, square kilometers and an Area of 923, 768, 64 square kilometers. Administratively, it has 36 states with one federal capital; territory. The capital city is located in Abuja from 12th December 1991 but was formerly in Lagos. According to 1990 census, the level of literacy in Nigeria is relatively low with an Adult literacy of 57.1%. Its population of 140,003,542 is made up of a multidenominational faith with Christianity and the Muslim religion being dominant. It is a country with ethnicity and divided into three sectarian groups, the North, the South and the West. In the south, there is also the South South and the South East.
Source: 2013 Enugu State Diary Printed by Enugu Government Press pg. 4.
2.7 Management of Intellectual Property as an Intangible Asset
Intellectual Property is an intangible asset and needs proper management to guard it for getting the maximum return on investment. It is a tool for gaining competitive advantage in the rather competitive market of today. The firms should therefore attach much importance in the management of their IP portfolio. In Ige (2005:10), intellectual property management is the management of that area of the economy which concerns the rights associated with creative efforts or commercial reputation or goodwill that deals with protection of invention. It can be passed on to someone just like other kinds of property like gifts, seal and/or bequest. It could be temporal or permanent in nature.
Gassman (2012:7) concludes that the effective management of intellectual property is an increasingly complex challenge in today’s global knowledge economy which needs to be addressed. However, for the purpose of this paper, the main problem is the fact that Intellectual Property is the most visible form of intangible assets. It is an understatement to say that it is more difficult to manage intangible assets as compared to tangible assets, especially for firms with large intellectual property portfolios. These portfolios involve all types of intellectual property. The accumulation of the intellectual property and the growth of the firm pose great challenges on the effective management of intellectual property for example large portfolio firms face the challenge of designing strategies and implementation structures and processes to enable an efficient intellectual property management for growth, productivity and the firms general performance. The process of IP management is as shown below;
Figure 2.2: IP Management Framework
Source: Culled and Adapted from Sople, V. V., (2010)Managing Intellectual Property: The Strategic Imperative.New Delhi PHI Learning Private Limited, p. 26.
One notable problem is that many companies delegate the responsibilities of managing intellectual property to legal staff that tend to be little involved in strategic planning and decision making. Another major problem is that intellectual property seems to be managed like other properties with the drivers of the process not recognizing that certain factors are important to be considered in taking certain decisions as to the management style and the approach to be adopted. Suffice it to say that the cyclicality, fluctuation, and periodicity of the technology require the dynamic management of the intellectual property (IP) in enterprises.Yong and Zao (2010)note that it is an unfortunate thing that companies do not connect the management of their IP to the underlying technology life cycle (TLC). Apparently, companies do not change the management of IP in different stages of the TLC. This results to most companies using‘one-size-fits-all’ method to manage all kinds of IP and different technologies.
Gassman (2012:19) categorizes the activity of intellectual property management in the following perspectives; Generation of intellectual property which is creating the knowledge;Protection of the ideas through intellectual property rights; andSubsequent exploitation of the ideas or the innovation to appropriate returns either internally through securing own products or externally through licensing.
Three phases are therefore involved in the process which starts from generating which is idea finding which involves the process of thinking around realization process and then registering it. The registration is characterized by a strong technological focus mainly resulting from research and development outcomes and driven by technology search activities. In addition to the human person whose ingenuity makes production possible, efforts must be made to ensure that intellectual property are assessed, allocated and managed according to needs and priorities to actualize high productivity and growth in our industries for national economic development (Ike, 2013:20)
2.8 The Decision to Innovate
Innovation in its many forms has been recognized as a critical dimension in improving economic performance in knowledge-driven economies. The innovation activity of firms is a key driver of competitiveness and economic growth. Although the process occurs at a company level through skillful management, a firm’s innovation performance can be enhanced by appropriate policy measures conducted in a business-friendly environment. Therefore, the identification of the policy options and instruments available to enhance the innovative capabilities of firms is an important component of any strategy to support it. Prime in any innovation research of any manufacturing firm should therefore be to answer the question; what factors influencethe firms’ intention and/or decision to innovate. The decision to innovate is an important decision for firms.Once a company decides to be active in innovation, the company has to dedicate resources to the innovation process. A company can decideto be at the forefront of new development, or decide to follow the new developmentsonce they proved to be interesting or do nothing at all. Once the decision to innovate ismade, the firm has to clear resources (financial and in time), by allocating to the process.However, this must be matched with an equal decision to protect those inventions and creations otherwise the firm’s performance, profitability, sustainability, and growth will be at its low ebb. The decision again may be influenced by the size of the firm, the export intensity, the availability of R&D department and characteristics of the employees especially as regards their level of education. Process characteristics such as the mission of the firm influence the innovation decision too. Generally, the decision to innovate is an important decision for companies.
To distinguish innovative firms from non-innovative firms, the sales of new or improvedproducts (e.g. introduced the last three years) is often commonly used. Other factors like technological opportunities, factor intensity and sector characteristics also influence the innovation decision. Loofet al. (2001:37), note that in high technological potentials sector, firms are more inclined to innovate. If they do not innovate, they may lose their market position.
Accordingly, there is a tremendous value of intellectual capital to the creations and marketing of products in all industries including the fashion industry both at low and high end of fashion market. In the current business environment, the primary source of competitive advantage for all business is innovation and original creative expressions. In the US, Wang wedding dress and Dr Martins boots are the products of applied intellectual creativity and skills in the fashion industry. Sople(2010:291) posits that business managers need to identify such valuable intangible assets in a timely manner, determine their business relevance and agree on those to be protected and leveraged through the intellectual property system.
2.9 Reasons why an Intellectual Property Holder should License his IP
Many companies have inventions they do not exploit internally, especially when the inventions fall outside the company’s core business. In such cases, licensing the technology to a third party can provide revenue without danger of undue competition. This will also help to leverage economic value from intellectual assets. According to the WIPO International handbook, Intellectual Property broadly means the legal rights from intellectual activities in the industrial, scientific, literally and artistic fields. Countries have laws to protect their Intellectual Property for various reasons. Some of such reasons are;
• To give statutory expression to the moral and economic rights of creators in their creation and the rights of the public access to those creations.
• To promote as a deliberate act of government policy, creativity and dissemination and application of its result and to encourage fair trading which will contribute to economic and social development.
In spite of these reasons, there are still other primary problems even when these laws are enacted. With respect to incentive theory, the primary problem is lack of the information necessary to apply the analytic. To what extent is the production of specific sorts of intellectual products dependent upon maintenance of copyright or patent protection or any other protection for that matter? Somecommentators have answered: to a very little extent. Other monetary or nonmonetary rewards such as profits attributable to lead time; inventors’ opportunities to speculate in markets that will be affected by the revelation of their inventions; the prestige enjoyed by artistic and scientific innovators; academic tenure; and the love of art would be sufficient to sustain current levels of production even in the absence of intellectual-property protection. Nevertheless, other commentators sharply disagree. The truth is that we don't have enough information to know who is right.
2. 10 Intellectual Property Valuation
Due to the impact of intellectual property on firm’s decision making and performance, intellectual property valuation is seen as a control activity of intellectual property management especially in preparing for commercialization of intellectual property.
Ochigbo(2010:35), conveys that intellectual property valuation is an attempt to ascertain information about the intellectual property in question to help the agency make more informed decision when managing its’ intellectual property assets. It is essentially bringing together the economic concept of the value and the legal concept of the property. Assets like know-how (talents, skill and knowledge) are valuable assets but more difficult to identify in terms of the earning and the profit they generate. The presence of an asset is a function of its ability to generate a return and the discount rate applied to the return. Such questions as; what are the intellectual property rights used in the business; what is the value, hence the risk; who owns it; what is the purpose; and how may it be better exploited. All these questions must be answered for valuation of intellectual property to be done properly. For the same reason why management needs to know the value of their tangible assets, so also they should know the value of their intangible assets. The value of intellectual property to each party however varies because it usually depends on the circumstance of each party. The different parties that can be identified are administrator, owner, innovator, and sponsor or the firm itself.
Furthermore, Ochigbo (2010:41) indicates that the value allocated to each property may also depend on the method of valuation. There are various types of valuation of identifiable intellectual property but acceptable method fall into three broad categories; market based, cost based, or based on estimate of past and future benefits.
The degree to which a company exploits its intellectual capital is also a key factor. Because of this, business managers obviously need to know the value of all assets and liability under their stewardship and control to make sure that these values are maintained. Nwauche(2000:150) identifies four main value concepts; Owner value, Market value, Fair value, and Tax value. Generally, economists believe that the cardinal rule of any valuation is that the value of something can’t be stated in the abstract. All that can be stated is the value of a thing in a particular place, at a particular time and in a particular circumstance. This rule should also be significant in application and management of intellectual property in order for managers to excel in the effective management and usage of intellectual property of their firms in enhancingproductivity, efficiency and effectiveness which leads to improved performance. Effective Intellectual Property valuation will not only benefit the property owner but also the poor, especially in agriculture, industries, and other manufacturing firms. Other opportunities which can be derived from effective and efficient valuation include boosting investments from resourceful organizations and encouraging foreign investors.
The direct product of research is knowledge which can be in form of new technology, new products, new process and improvement in existing products, process and technology. Hence, research and development of knowledge is only useful if it can lead to economic and human development.
2.10.1 How can Intellectual Property Enhance the Market Value of your Manufacturing Company?
The value of intellectual property (IP) is often not adequately appreciated and its potential for providing opportunities for future profit is widely underestimated by organisations, agencies and even Government. Consequently, for business organisations like manufacturing companies, when IP is legally protected and there is demand for the IP protected products and/or services in the marketplace, IP can become a valuable business asset.It may generate an income for your manufacturing company through the licensing, sale, or commercialization of the IP-protected products or services that may significantly improve an enterprise’s market share or raise its profit margins,(http://www.wipo.int/man.co)
IP rights can enhance the value or worth of your industry in the eyes of investors and finance institutions. In the event of a sale, merger or acquisition, IP assets may significantly raise the value of your enterprise, and at times may be the primary or only true assets of value. The strategic utilization of IP assets can, therefore, substantially enhance the competitiveness of your industry. Manufacturing companies should thenmake sure that they are ready to face the challenge and take measures to exploit their IP and protect it wherever possible. Like physical assets, IP assets must be acquired and maintained, accounted for, valued, monitored closely, and managed strategically in order to extract their full value. All the same, before this can be done, industries must first acknowledge the value of IP and begin to see it as a valuable business asset.Often, IP protection in industries relies upon the simple inimitability of their intangibles. A common problem in accounting for firm’s intangibles is thus that they tend to constitute clusters relating to the nature of the business or the products involved, and therefore can be neither isolated nor quantified. The dependence of firms on the ‘human capital’ of the owner/manager and perhaps a few others exacerbates this ambiguity. For example, an employee’s PhD in a relevant field of research, while invaluable to the operation of the firm, is hardly the ‘property’ of that firm. The informalities and idiosyncrasies of businesses, coupled with the fact that small and medium size firms intangibles often involve tacit knowledge acquired through experience, again makes assigning a market value more difficult. Such issues would require significant revision of current accounting practices if they were to be fully addressed.
2.11 Types and Functions of Intellectual Property Rights
The World Intellectual Property Organisation has broadly classified IP into two types; Industrial property and Artistic Work. These types again involves different forms which are; Patents, Trademarks, Trade secrets and industrial designs all under Industrial Property while Copyright, Traditional knowledge, Plant Variety and lately Geographical Indications are under Artistic Work. Integrated Circuit Unit is also a recent inclusion under industrial property. It is noteworthy to emphasise that another recent inclusion of Geographical indications has drawn more attention to the subject.
Within the manufacturing sector different Intellectual Property rights may be obtained, used and enforced, for example trademarks may be obtained for the brand name of a particular product or process. Copyright may apply to the literature developed in relation to a product while patents, knowhow and trade secrets may be applicable to an invention or innovation being developed. The development of the type to use depends on several other factors and the manufacturing firm plus the type of product or service they offer. The main types of IP are explained as shown in the chart below.
Figure 2.3: Types of IP Rights
Source: Adapted from Sople, V. V. (2010) Managing Intellectual Property: The Strategic Imperative. New Delhi PHI Learning Private Limited, p. 70.
The following subsections also provide a brief overview of some of these major forms of Intellectual Property Rights.
2.11.1 Industrial Design
Industrial design is another type of intellectual property rights used by industries to mark their products and processes. For Steve Jobs, CEO, Apple, (2005), in Sople (2010: 167) design is the fundamental soul of a human made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service.Manufacturers are no more concerned only with the core product or service; the way or method of presentation is also of significant importance. Articles of unique shape are produced en masses by industrial process and these started after the industrial revolution. Today, manufacturers are paying adequate attention to the designs of the article they produce to differentiate from their competitors. Here, visual attraction enhances the marketability of the product. The visual aspect covers the shape, the body, shape of packaging and the container. World intellectual property organization defines an industrial design as an ornamental or aesthetic aspect of an article. Usually, to be qualified for protection, the design must appeal to the eye. This means that industrial design does not protect any technical part of the product. When this protection is given, the owner, person or entity that has registered it is assured of an exclusive right against unauthorized copying or imitation of the designs by thirds parties. This will of course help to ensure a fair return on investment.
Industrial Property Rights
Industrial Property on the other hand involves patents, trademarks, trade secrets, industrial designs, utility models and appellations of origin (Owoseni, 2001:15)
2.11.2 Patents
A patent is a right granted for an invention, a product or a process that provides a new way of doing something or offers a new technical solution to a problem (Well, 2009:11). InRoderick et al, (1997:4), it is taken that a patent is available to a person who invents, or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof. Despite the plain language of the statute, a patent does not necessarily belong to the person who creates a patentable product or device. The legal right is not automatic. One has to apply for it.It is pertinent to note here that in order for a product or process to be patentable, an invention must fulfil certain criteria of novelty including industrial use which is its utility. Subject to several important exceptions, patent enables the patent holder to exclude unauthorized parties from making, using or offering for sale or any economic use. It is usually offered for a period of 20years from the date of filling the application for patent and the term may also be extended for a period of time. Menell (1999) conveys that patents as studies have found were rarely the principal means of appropriating returns in most industries, except in pharmaceuticals and chemicals. Patents play an important role in the pharmaceutical industries. Sople (2010:266) points out that the pharmaceutical industry is one of the three technologies based industries in which the patent virtually equals the product. The others are the chemical industry (including agricultural chemicals) and the biotechnology industry where innovations span the spectrum from engineered plant variety to human pharmaceutical therapy. In summary, Patent rights protect inventions and some kinds of discoveries. It isan official document giving the holder of the patent the sole right to make, use or sell an invention and prevent others from imitating it. Inventions may be product or process. It gives the owner the exclusive right to commercially exploit the invention for the life of the patent.
2.11.3 Trademarks
A trademark is a distinctive graphic, word, sign or symbol that identifies and distinguishes certain goods or services as those produced or provided by a specific person or enterprise. They are marks external to the goods to make the public identify a certain quality and image associated with that product or service. It speaks about the products origin and quality. It is used as product differentiator. It provides protection to the holder of the mark by ensuring the exclusion right to use that mark to identify goods or services, or to authorize another to use it in return for payment (Well, R., 2009:12). Trademarks have enormous value for an enterprise. However to the consumer, it is principally concerned that the consumers are not misled in the market place and hence is particularly amenable to economic analysis. The good trademarks play a role in the minds of the consumer and they feel a sense of belonging because of the quality of the product. The objective of this system is to help consumers identify and purchase a product or service because of its nature and quality indicated by its unique trademarks which meet their needs. In today’s competitive market, the importance of trademark as an intellectual property cannot be ignored because it is a valuable IP asset. Sometimes over the years, a trademark usually becomes synonymous with the goods example, Xerox for photocopying. There are four categories of trade mark; Descriptive mark, Generic mark, Suggestive mark and Fanciful or Arbitrary mark.Trademarks may be obtained for the brand-name of a particular product or process. Patents, know-how and trade secrets may be applicable at the same time to an invention or innovation being developed
Trademarks are renewed indefinitely after payment of an additional fee and the period of protection varies. It can also be sold to other parties. Trademark law protects words and symbol that identify products and services for consumer’s advertisement and services manufactured or supplied by particular persons or firms.
Trademarks perform a valuable micro economic function in terms of identifying the origin of the product and technology in terms of accountability to the consumer. They also play strategic marketing role for individual enterprises. They are the basic element of franchising and help to cement consumer loyalty. In Idris (2012:9), the International Franchise Association (IFA) estimates that franchising accounts for one third of retail sales in United State e.g. McDonald, Coca cola and General motors’ are all possible because of intellectual property rights like trademarks and trade secrets. Copyright organizations and individuals use the protection to monitor their use of talents as this can be eternally difficult. The income generated contributes significantly to gross development product (GDP) of the nation.
2.11.4 Trade Secret
As is portrayed by Wells (2001:18) a trade secret is any official business information that provides a business with a competitive edge in the business environment. It is an IP of which the business organization is the lawful owner or custodian of the same so that the information is not used by others without their permission or consent for commercial exploitation. The information is a trade secret so long as it is not known to others. What is considered to be a trade secret is broad and includes manufacturing, industrial or commercial secrets. It may consist of any formula, pattern, device or compilation of information. Other items like employee training methods, customer data base or supplier’s information may also be included. The popular Coca-Cola Company has maintained a trade secret for ages which has kept their competitors away over so many years. Experts believe that the formula for Coca-Cola is the most valuable trade secret in the world. It is not protected by patents and the names are both registered trademarks, Kelleher (2005) in Sople (2010:155). A trade secret has an unlimited period of time of protection as long as it is actually kept secret. Trade secret law often protects utilitarian works. Good examples of trade secrets are sales methods, distribution methods, and list of clients, suppliers, advertising strategies, and manufacturing process. Trade secret laws protect commercially valuable information like soft drink formulas, and confidential marketing strategies, beverage constitutions and other things that firms attempt to conceal from their competitors.
2.11.5 Copyright
Copy right is a bundle of exclusive rights granted by law to creators of artistic and literally works. Copyright deals primarily with literary, musical and artistic creations such as books, arts, music, films and broadcasts as well as live performances and expressions of folklores and most recently new genre of work in terms of multimedia production which is made accessible by a computer program. It may also apply to the literature developed in relations to a product. Intellectual property protection provide for copyright protection for "original works of authorship fixed in any tangible medium of expression from which they can be perceived, reproduced or otherwise communicated.", Nwauche(2000:15).
The protection arises upon creation of the work but enforcement of the right requires registration with the national body that registers Copyrights upon application and deposit of copies of the work. Note that it is limited to an author’s expression of idea, process and concept in a tangible medium. There is no copy right in an idea. It is only in an expression of an idea. It protects the object from unlawful reproduction, plagiarism, piracy, copying and imitation. Copyright law implicates a broader array of personal interests of the creator than patent law. The law of copyright protects various “original forms of expression, including novels, movies, musical compositions, and computer software programs. The “right of publicity” protects celebrities’ interests in their images and identities.
The term of the copyright is a specified period and it is renewable, (Roderick et al 1997:9). Copyright provides the right to exclude others from copying expressive works of authors, writers, composers, actors etc. University licensing practices is a land of unity knowledge subject to intellectual property,but does not cover ideas, procedures, and methods of operation or mathematical concept. It provides the protection to original works ofarts and other literal works. The works covered by copyright include novels, poems, plays, reference works, computer programmes, films, musical compositions, choreography, artistic works such as paintings, sculpture, architecture etc. Unlike patents, copyright does not depend on official procedures but starts to exist from the moment of creation and registration of the literary or artistic work.
Authorization from the right holder is required in order to copy, publish, distribute or broadcast the protected work. This also applies to other intellectual property rights. Copyright has a time limit according to WIPO treaties. A copyrightable work may be of a single author or a group of authors, who have collaborated on a project. It is an original work of authorship which has been fixed in or otherwise communicated to the public through books, videos, tapes etc. (Roderick, 1997: 13). It therefore subsists in Artistic work, Dramatic Work, Literally Work, Computer Programme, and Musical Work.
2.11.6 Traditional Knowledge
Traditional knowledge refers to laws protecting the tradition of certain communities and villages. It includes knowledge systems, cultural expression, creations and innovations which have been generally transmitted from generation to generation and are generally regarded as pertaining to a particular people or its territory and are constantly evolving in response to a changing environment. It is knowledge and innovation practices of indigenous people around various communities in different parts of the world, developed from the experience gained over the centuries and adapted as per the local culture and environment. It is usually transmitted orally from one generation to the next. It tends to be collectively owned. It is found practically in such fields like agriculture, fisheries, health, horticulture and forestry. Items resulting from intellectual activities in the industries are excluded from traditional knowledge. Sople(2010:212) lists the categories of traditional knowledge and they include; expressions of folk lore in the form of music, dance, song, handicrafts, artwork`, geographical indications and other similar elements of heritage.
2.11.7 Geographical Indications (GI)
A Geographical indication is a sign used on goods that have a specific geographical origin and possess qualities or a reputation that are due to that place of origin. Commonly, it consists of the name of the place of origin of the goods. Agricultural products usually fall into this category because of certain qualities that they derive from their place of production. They are also influenced by specific local factors such as climate and soil. It may be used for a wide variety of agricultural products. It is the newest addition to intellectual property rights. Sople(2010:178), defines GI as the indications which identify a good as originating in the territory of a member, or a region, or a locality in that territory, where a given quality, reputation or other characteristics of the good is essentially attributable to its geographical origin. Some regions acquire a reputation for the quality of the products in those regions over a period of time. When such a reputation is gained, there may be attempts by some people to use it for their selfish motives of making money. This is seen mostly in agricultural products where nature plays a major role in production and quality of the product. It may also be about the culture, geography, tradition, heritage and traditional practice of people and/or countries.
2.12 Economic Value of Intellectual Property
One of the major importance of intellectual property rights is that it is instrumental for innovations be it developing or developed/industrialized countries. Most importantly, Intellectual Property system provides a boost to national wealth and contributes considerably to its sustainable development. It also helps the nation to enhance its international trade. Patents system promotes technology and businesses specific period during which they have exclusive rights over their exploitations. As a result, both the businesses and their competitors race to improve those inventions and to use the technology to create new ones. The patent also gives the inventors a temporal shelter from the force of market competitions which is limited to the precise terms of the patent.
In the medium and long terms, intangible assets are the main driving force of economic growth in leading economies. On the other hand, economic growth can't be achieved without increase in productivity of various sectors of the economy. However there are other sources of economic growth such as bringing a larger share of the property into employment, industrialization and commercialization. Yet, they are still mainly dependent on intellectual property and how much protection these properties are getting. This is because with all the years, the law of diminishing returns sets in because economic growth which is not based on intellectual property but on producing more and more of the same goods and services using same old production processes eventually diminishes and becomes outdated and the only thing to sustain economic growth becomes intellectual property. They are therefore constrained in their growth.However innovative economic growth are not constrained in growth by diminishing returns because they grow by making new, better and more varied products, process and services (Well, 2000:5)The economic and cultural importance of this collection of rules is increasing rapidly. The fortunes of many businesses now depend heavily on intellectual Property. To the manufacturing companies, it has an added advantage of sustaining them through growth, and increase in profit.
References are made to the role of intellectual property in stimulating the production and disseminating works of intellects in the industries especially as it regards research and development. This intellectual protection acts as a spur to human creativity, pushing back the limits of science and technology and enriching the world of literature and the arts. By providing a stable environment for marketing products protected by intellectual property, it also oils the wheels of international trade. References are also made to the importance of rewarding authors, inventors and innovators for their labour. Inducing productivity and dissemination of knowledge and works of intellects is the primary objectives of the statutes of these rights. In the statement by justice Reed Jake, sacrificial days developed to creative activities deserve rewards commensurate with services rendered (Fisher, 2013:14).
Most often, proponents of Intellectual Property rights routinely make arguments like; our American society is founded on the principle that the one who creates something of value is entitled to enjoy the fruits of his labour. The shift from mass production to a knowledge based economy characterized by highly differentiated products is greater knowledge content and the changing nature of innovation marked the growing importance of intellectual property. In order to generate innovations to bring new or improved products or services to market, or to introduce new or improved production processes, firms need to undertake investments into research and development, (R/ D).
These investments are often highly risky, expensive, and take a long time to come to function, for example it takes up to a decade or more in the cases of medicals and pharmaceuticals. In Fisher (2013:29), firms may have to start dozens of research projects in order to achieve some communal success. This however depends on the industry, Pharmaceutical companies’ research hundreds of molecular group to produce one marketable drug. Similarly, less than 2% of movies account for 80% of box office returns. Most times less than 20% of investments on research and development are earned by venture capitalists and most firms fail within a short period of time.
Secondly, once a breakthrough is achieved and a firm creates a new market, competitors will start by imitating the successful innovators. This benefits consumers because it drives down prices of the new product or service. However it is potentially harmful in the long run because it may prevent the innovator from carrying a profit margin high enough to recover the money spent on the Research and Development both the failed ones and the successful ones. Usually this will undermine their incentive to innovate in the future, and even deter other new inventors from engaging in research and development. It is therefore important that management of Intellectual Property should be done with utmost care to protect the inventions for the owners. Managers across all industries typically rank lead times and confidentiality agreements ahead of formal Intellectual Property rights as tools to protect their competitive advantages. This may not be the best for the firms.
Formal Intellectual Property rights are therefore policy tools intended to protect innovators from imitating competitors long enough so that they can earn sufficient profits to recover the costs of innovation while encouraging innovators to make their new gained knowledge available to the public so that other innovators can build on it.
Effective management and protection of Intellectual Property can be seen as a quid pro quo between innovators and society. So much resources is required; time, funds (owned or borrowed), creative effort, innovations effort, persistence and focused management of the entire process from idea to market (Nerkar, and Shane, 2003:16)
The promise underlying Intellectual Property throughout its history has been that the recognition and reward associated with ownership of inventions and creative works stimulate further inventions and creative activity that stimulate economic growth and productivity, the continuum goes from problem to knowledge; to imagination; to innovation; toIntellectual Property and then the solution to the problem in the form of improved products and new technologies. No wonder Schumpeter(2007:16), sites a quotation by Joseph A. S as "Competition from the new commodity, the new technology, the new source of supply, the new type of organization, IP is the powerful lever that in the long run expands output." Also as Abraham Lincoln rightly put it; "The patent system adds the fuel of interest to the fire of genius."
Thus, an intellectual property system can help in further expanding a countries economic and trade progammes. It can also help in intensifying research activities in business and academic institutions for facilitating technology development.
2.13 Assessment and Control of Intellectual Property in Nigeria
The cyclicality, fluctuation, and periodicity of the technology require the dynamic management of the intellectual property (IP) in enterprises. Unfortunately, in Nigeria, most companies do not connect the management of their IP to the underlying Technology Life Cycle (TLC), and companies do not change the management of IP in different stages of the TLC. Anyway, most companies use one-size-fits-all method to manage all kinds of IP and different technologies. The researcher would want to arouse the attention on TLC characteristics of IP management in business fields. An IP management model is proposed to deal with the one-size-fits-all issue from the perspective of TLC which manifests the importance of phase characteristics of the technology in IP management. The IP management strategy should thus vary with the periods of TLC.
2.14 Intellectual Property Theft in Organizations; who they are and when they steal.
The fact that Intellectual Property rights have economic value, may be bought and sold, gained and lost, and may contribute to their owner’s ability to become autonomous and engage in independent political action causes intellectual property theft. Today’s corporate and government leaders are besieged by reports of economic espionage and theft of intellectual property by individual agents, organized hackers, corporate competitors and even nation and states. Reports of rampant intellectual property theft have contributed to an anxious, war-time mindset as economic competition has replaced political and military confrontation between major world powers.According to earlier reviews by Shaw, and Stock(2010),the theft of trade secrets has cost U.S. businesses more than $250 billion per year and these thefts are increasing exponentially and should double within the next decade. According to other sources, 60 percent of companies polled reported they had experienced attempts to steal their proprietaryinformation. The most frequent perpetrators were current or former employees or partners in trusted relationships such ascustomers, contractors, vendors, and joint venture partners. FBI reports have confirmed insiders are a major target in opponentefforts to gain proprietary information and are also a leading source of these leaks. This has further increased leadershipanxiety and contributed to significant concerns regarding organizational loyalty and trust.
In the words of Adebayo (2012:17) regulating Intellectual Property in the Nigerian cyberspace is an uphill task. The growth of internet has put pressure on traditional Intellectual Property protection such as copyright, patent etc. Some forms of information that were made accessible in the internet are easily copied. Because the cost of copying is low and because copying is often anonymous, it is easy for them. While the potential exposure and market penetration for business in cyber space is endless, so is the potential infringement and theft of company secrets, brand identifiers and other Intellectual Properties. From the legal perspective, there is obviously a crisis of policy development and lack of adequate protection and recognition of the enormous human resources that constitute the creative base of the nascent local knowledge economy whether in the field of copyright, trademark, patent or any other right. Moore,et al. (2012:56)agree that the majority of IP theft is committed by current male employees averaging about 37 years of age who serve in mainly technical positions. The most prevalent positions were engineers or scientists, managers, salespersons and programmers, in descending order of frequency. About 65 percent of these employees had already accepted positions with a competing company or started their own company at the time of the theft. Fifty-six percent of these subjects stole data within a month of their departure or whenever a resignation is proffered or such a possibility arises. Perhaps as frightening as the frequency of insider thefts is the fact that these employees don’t always act alone. In about a quarter of these cases the insider was recruited by an outsider who had targeted the data and about 20 percent of thefts involved collaboration with another insider. The most frightening scenario we find in our case data related to these figures is the insider who organizes a group of coworkers to leave together, taking critical IP with them, with the last person out destroying the organization’s original records. They had authorized access to support the conclusion that subjects take the data they know, work with and, often, feel entitled to. The fact that these individuals are stealing data to which they had authorized access also complicates an organization’s ability to protect this property through technical sensors.
Another interesting thing is the period of time that these stealing take place. Unlike other forms of computer crime, most of these IP thefts occur during working hours, at the work site, which is consistent with the subject’s routine authorized access to this information. Most frequently these were quick attacks. Over two-thirds lasted less than a month, consistent with their need to take the information on their way out and use it at a new job or to start a business.Channels through which insiders stole this information could be; access, file transfer or downloads to laptops. Other IP risks include litigation risks, technology change and risk of infringement. Nevertheless, risk of infringement can be protected by insuring ones IP. Despite all these, countries policies still encourage registration of intellectual property but statistics available indicate that patent applications emanate more from advanced countries while Africa accounts for less than 1% of the total patent applications.
Table2.2: Showing number of Patents Registration and Percentages of Countries
COLOUM 1 COLOUM 2 COLOUM 3 COLOUM 4 COLOUM 5
Countries No of patents; yr 2002 to 2006 No of Patents; yr 2007 to 2011 Percentage 2002 to 2006 Percentage 2007 to 2011
cxSA 1408365 1550725 95.8 93.7
CANADA 5315 6834 0.36 0.41
UK 20384 30195 1.38 1.82
JAPAN 30098 60675 2.04 3.66
AFRICA 5065 5628 0.34 0.34
TOTAL NO OF APPLICATION 1469227
1654057 99.92 99.91
Source: Watungu, W., Nyukuri, E., and Sikoyo, M., (2012) “The Value of Intellectual Property, Intangible Assets and Goodwill,” STI Working Paper No 7 0f the Organization for Economic and Community Development Countries, (OECD) Vol. 33 No. 7 p. 13.
Table2.3: Number of patent applications for Africa, Canada, Japan, United Kingdom and United States for year 2000 to 2011
Source: www.wipo.int/sme/en/best_practices/garching_innovation.htm. Viewed April 2014
Figure 2.4: Line graph representing the Patent Registration of IP in the countries mentioned above.
Source:www.wipo.int/sme/en/best_practices/garching_innovation.htm. Viewed April 2014
Figure 2.5: Bar Chart representing the Patent Registration of IP in the Countries mentioned above.
Source: www.wipo.int/sme/en/best_practices/garching_innovation.htm. Viewed April 2014
Table 2.4: Representing the Relative percentages of Patent Registration of each country with Africa being less than 1%
2.15 The World Intellectual Property Institute, (WIPO)
Established in 1970, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is an international organization dedicated to ensuring that the rights of creators and owners of intellectual property are protected worldwide, and that inventors and authors are therefore recognized and rewarded for their ingenuity. Headquartered in Geneva, WIPO is the specialized United Nations Agencythat serves as the secretariat for administration of the global intellectual property treaties. It is the principal forum for negotiation of new patent treaties and the leading provider of technical assistance to developing countries in the field of intellectual property rights. WIPO was created in 1967 as the successor organization to the international bureau for the protection of intellectual property, which had been in existence since the nineteenth century. It currently has 129 states on its membership lists. Intellectual Property Institute is dedicated to increasing awareness and understanding the use of Intellectual Property as a tool for economic growth, particularly in countries with growing economy. The institute is engaged in a wide range of activities including research, public enlightenment, specialized training and workshops, technical assistance and consulting services.
Mission
• To build a platform for the creation, understanding and exploitation of Intellectual Property thereby transforming intellectual capital into technological and economic development
• To increase the understanding, creation, use and exploitation of limited capital by organizations and individuals.
• To increase awareness and understanding of the use of Intellectual Property patents, copyright, trademarks, trade secrets, industry design, trade designs and knowledge management systems as tools for sustainable economic growth.
Source:Sople, V. V. (2010), Managing Intellectual Property: The Strategic Imperative. New Delhi PHI Learning Private Limited page 18.
2.16 The World Trade Organization (WTO)
The World Trade Organization was established in 1994 in Marrakech following the successful conclusion of the Uruguay Round of Trade Negotiation. The predecessor to WTO was the general agreement on Tariffs and Trade, (GATT)(Sople, 2010:18). It is important to note that most of the agreements were intended to create a more equitable system of international trade. Wealthy countries agreed to reduce their barriers to price competitive imports while developing countries agreed to open their markets to the high value added exports of the developed nation. This export consists mainly of technology in which much of the value is intangible and must be protected by strong intellectual property regime for its effective exploitation.
2.17 Summary of the Review of Related Literature
Various literatures have been written emphasizing that effective IP policy is essential for economic growth both in developed and developing countries. Countries that are advanced are aware of this because they are increasingly optimizing the use of intellectual properties in moving their economy forward. Azinge et al (2011) indicate this by emphasizing that the progress and well being of humanity rests in the capacity to create, and invent in areas of technology and culture and then the legal protection of new creationencourage commitment of additional resources. He also points out that promotion and protection of IP spurs economic growth. Increasingly, manufacturing companies in the advanced world are being measured in part against this criterion, as society expects tangible economic benefits. On the other hand, countries that are still developing are utilizing the use of such properties but are still not fully aware of the benefits due to certain factors militating against it. This is supported by Noble (2007) in his conclusion that developing countries need not only to implore more appropriate IP policies to support innovation but also to adopt strategic management because even where the policies seem to be appropriate, poor management poses another problem. This is one of the biggest problems that have negative implication on IP utilization. In furtherance to this, Smith (2000) recommends that manufacturing companies should also look at their IP policies in relation to their individual business models because doing this will enable them to set overall IP strategies that will optimize the benefits that can be gained from it. The substance of these policies again differs from one organization to another and that is what determines the level of their performance. The problem seems to be more obvious in small and medium size enterprises. Akpotaire (2011) believes that these industries barely know the need for effective and strategic management and control of the properties. That is why he concludes that small and medium enterprises often reflect it in their characteristics of the way they use IP especially in developing countries.This accounts for why one of his recommendations is that among other things, strategic management should be employed in IP administration just like in the physical properties.
Majority of these manufacturing companies do not even have research and development departments. This is indicated in the responses from the field report of the data collected by the researcher. Registration of patents and other rights are not being fully exploited in African countries including Nigeria. Various reasons contribute to this including but not limited to most of the policies not supporting the practice This is epitomized in Watungu et al (2012) shown in table 2.2 where it is indicated that even though some developing countries policies encourage registration, statistics available show that they account for only 0.34% of registration between (2002) to (2011). Again, even where policies are put on ground, the poor level of infrastructural development usually hampers the practice especially during implementation. To be successful at its growth, market share, profitability, productivity and knowledgetransfer, any manufacturing industry must recognize the importance of intellectual property protection.
Nevertheless, in many instances, knowledge will mosteffectively be transferred simply by putting research results into the public domain.Consulting by research and development department can also be an important and effective conduit for knowledge transfer. These activities require the manufacturing companies to file patents and to license them, and engage into other kinds of registrations that will help protect whatever property they may have acquired even when they want to transfer, sale, or share.This being the case, most technologies resulting from research and development will require substantial and risky investment before they can be turned into commercially successfulproducts, services or processes. Organizations will have to decide on how many resources and the type of resources to devote topatenting, trade mark etc for commercialization. This decision will depend on the organizations overall knowledge utilization strategy,which in turn will depend on its relative strengths in research, and consulting.
Intellectual property rights are therefore crucial to the business organizations. They are stimulus to innovations. They are vehicle for technology transfer and attract finances for further development of IP. For business corporations to operate in the market driven economies, the intellectual property similar to the rights in the form of physical property are necessary to protect their products or services from being copied or stolen by others.
The registration of IP with proper authority gives owner the legal rights to bar others from practicing his IP. The owner can make money out of IP by practicing it or licensing others to practice it. The types of IP protection used for each product depend on the product and its vulnerability to get copied or misappropriated by others. The owner can protect his creation under one or all IP rights such as Patents, Copyrights, Trademark or Design. In a nutshell, the wealth of nations is created by IP and recognition of IPR will change our scientific culture from copying to creativity especially in the third world countries where copying is the other of the day.
In as much as writers have done much work on this important topic, there is still a huge gap yet to be filled especially in our society. Having gone through the literature, it is discovered that most of the works are concentrated on the legal aspect of intellectual property.Authors concentrate more on the legal aspect of the concept rather than looking at the holistic view. Articles, Bulletins, journals,Research works both published and unpublished, all concentrate mainly on how the legal instruments address the various problems arising from offenders, prosecution, infringement, control, etc. Such other aspects like strategic management of IP and its effect on firm performance have not been generously addressed over the years because from the extensive review on the work, more literature is found on IP laws. Writers have also neglected the fact that there is need for attention to be drawn on the fact that certain level of infrastructural development is needed to support successful IP practice in any country especially the developing countries. Thirdly, much work has not been done on the need to educate and sensitize the populace about the existence of these rights and the benefits accruable to the usage.
Specifically speaking, the intellectual property strategy and the knowledge transfer strategy in general needto be in line with the mission of the firms. Unlike in the public research organizations which are not businesses,and whose primary mission remains to educate and to expand the frontiers of humanknowledge through fundamental or basic research for the advancement of science, the manufacturing firms are profit oriented therefore should not only consider cost while managing intellectual property, but should also include it while stating the vision and mission of the organization and finally the organizations business models..
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