3 Review(s)

Intellectual property (IP) rights are legal and institutional devices to protect creations of the mind such as inventions, works of art and literature, and designs. They also include marks on products to indicate their difference from similar ones sold by competitors. Over the years, the rather elastic IP concept has been stretched to include not only patents, copyrights, trademarks, and industrial designs but also trade secrets, plant breeders' rights, geographical indications, and rights to lay out designs of integrated circuits, among other things.