“Proper Implementation and enforcement of IP rights by a startup is imperative. IP protection not only provides security against third-party infringements but also enhances the valuation and attractiveness of a startup to investors” — International Lawyers Network on the protection of intellectual property rights in India.
UP ISSI, in celebration of its 50th founding anniversary, recently conducted a symposium entitled, “Rationalizing TBI Centers: Developing Strategies for UP Diliman” on 22 November 2016. It aimed to share the development strategies of technology business incubator (TBI) centers that are located in UP. Part of these strategies is to address the need to protect the startups’ new innovative ideas, including but not limited to product prototypes, business models as well as strategies in their marketing plans.
Ace C. Acosta of the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research and Development (OVCRD) of UP Diliman discussed intellectual property or IP, which refers to “any creation of the mind or everything that the human mind is capable of making”. He further explained that this includes literary and artistic works, inventions, designs, music, dance and plays. He also cited several cases to explain and simplify the concept of IP right or IPR and its benefits to the owner.
An IPR is the legal right of a creator or innovator to be recognized and to benefit from their work, he said. It is obtained through the registration of the IP at the IP Office.
Also in the roster of speakers in the symposium was UP ISSI’s Prof. Rolando Ramon C. Diaz, who discussed TBIs as a support program to startups that wanted to sell their technology-based products or services to the market. He explained the TBI’s key features as well as the guidelines for applying in the program.
Meanwhile, Janmar P. Dimaano, chief executive officer of Easybus.PH and one of UP ISSI’s incubatees, shared how their participation in the Institute’s Start Your Own Business (SYOB) course eventually led to their incubation in ISSI’s TBI program, which started in February 2016. Dimaano said they are in the “pre-incubation phase” of the program and they already applied for a patent for the software application they developed for an online bus booking system.
The symposium was hosted by UP ISSI TBI manager Reynold Ferdinand G. Manegdeg and Engr. Leoncio T. Cubillas, Jr., head of ISSI’s Business Enterprise Development Division. The latter welcomed the participants of the symposium, who were mostly composed of SYOB graduates, enterprise managers and guests from UP, Department of Agriculture, Department of Science and Technology, Department of Trade and Industry and Quezon City Polytechnic University.
UP ISSI’s TBI Center offers not only office spaces for startup entrepreneurs but also free business counseling, discounts to ISSI’s training programs as well as support linkage to the appropriate government agencies. For more information about the program, interested parties may download the brochure and manual in this website. They may also visit the OVCRD website to learn more about IPR.