Introduction
Intellectual property is intangible items such as computer software, a formula, any invention, and other items that an individual, university, or corporation claims they own (Shamoo & Resnik, 2009, p. 167). Therefore, there are different types of intellectual property rights that are recognized by the United States law (Shamoo & Resnik, 2009, p. 173). Consequently, laws pertaining to intellectual property rights have only been implemented since the 1980s, which these laws are of the Boyh-Dole Act of 1980 and the Technology Transfer Act of 1986 (Shamoo & Resnik, 2009, p. 170). As a result, intellectual property can have huge financial implications on healthcare research and pharmaceutical companies. Therefore, …show more content…
Therefore, trade secrets are used to prevent information from becoming publicly known such as the secret recipe for Coca-Cola (Shamoo & Resnik, 2009, p. 177). There are a variety of items that are used for trade secrets such as instruments, specific business policies, customer lists, and business plans (Shamoo & Resnik, 2009, p. 177). There are few advantages for trade secrets to be used in health care research and/or pharmaceutical companies.
Trade Secrets: Advantages
A trade secret may be more useful than the other types of intellectual property rights. However, within the healthcare research field and/or pharmaceutical companies they are more in likely better to benefit from a patent (Shamoo & Resnik, 2009, p. 177). There are state laws in place to help protect trade secrets and others can be prosecuted if a competitor utilizes the trade secret (Shamoo & Resnik, 2009, p. 177). However, trade secrets seem to have minimal use within the healthcare research industry.
Trade Secrets: …show more content…
177). Overall, former researchers and/or employers that know the trade secret may change jobs and disclose the information (Shamoo & Resnik, 2009, p. 177). In addition, the trade secrets could be accidently disclosed or the competitor can obtain the product and/or service and run their own tests on it to try to decipher the secret and provide a product with similar tastes, functions, and/or services (Shamoo & Resnik, 2009, p. 177). Therefore, researchers and/or pharmaceutical companies will least likely benefit from trade