Summary
The majority of businesses consider their intellectual property (IP) to be a valuable asset. There are two primary types of intellectual property: related and copyright rights and industrial-based property(Aristodemou&Tietze, 2018). Artistic works are protected by the entire copyright for around 50 years, while the 20-year overall industrial property regime safeguards industrial-based designs, inventions, and trademarks. Whenever an enterprise’s intellectual property is protected, it can thrive and grow without worrying that competitors will steal its secrets. In their quest to find a cure for COVID-19, policymakers have been bypassing patent restrictions and authorizing the commercialization of generic medications in violation of ordinary Intellectual Property rules. This step is a scary development for the pharmaceutical industry as they try to make sense of the new guidelines, but it may fundamentally alter the healthcare sector.
Balance: Customer Needs vs. Business Needs
How should a for-profit corporation balance its business needs with the needs of its customers?
In an ideal world, a firm run for profit would satisfy all the requirements of its clientele while increasing its bottom line. If the clientele’s needs are not met, it becomes difficult to imagine how a company could maintain its current level of profitability. Customers have a requirement to believe they are being listened to and provided for, and when they do not receive this, they tend to look elsewhere for services that will meet their requirements (Sánchez-Rebull et al., 2018). If a company sees a decrease in the number of consumers they serves, they have lost its equilibrium, and to restore it, it will need to adjust its business plan or strategies. Businesses must avoid being so preoccupied with profits and lose track of their clientele’s needs in addition to the original motivation behind the company’s establishment. When there are not enough consumers, there are not enough earnings, leading to a bad state for any company.
On the other hand, in the early stages of development, a company has to prioritize its interests above all others. For instance, a company should ensure that its customers have access to the COVID-19 vaccine regardless of their returns. During the early stages of a company’s customer base development, it is unrealistic to anticipate them prioritizing their consumers’ demands above all else. Ultimately, the firm’s future performance and the satisfaction of its customers depend on its ability to determine what those demands are significant. A firm’s priority must be to establish itself as a viable entity in the marketplace before turning its attention to the needs of its consumers. There are moments when a company’s internal priorities must get met ahead of its clients. Still, as profits begin to roll in, the customers’ demands have to be prioritized if the company is to survive and flourish. Therefore, to keep the clients returning, the company should do everything possible to make doing business with clients simple and easy to maneuver around. The company must show customers they value their business by actively listening to and responding to their concerns. If a company can keep its customers happy, it will continue to generate revenue.
Great Power Equals Greater Responsibility
Lives depend on products created by some companies. Do these companies have a greater responsibility to work towards benefitting the consumer more than themselves?
Yes. Most companies do, according to the available evidence that proves the credibility of this notion. Nevertheless, this is not necessarily the appropriate response in every situation. If a company wants to be successful, it should offer a high-quality product or products at an affordable price to its clientele, and only then can it hope to generate a profit (Naudé& Miller-Naudé, 2022). Since an individual’s capacity to pay often dictates if they ought to die or live, striking the right balance between attaining revenue targets and satisfying customers’ requirements throughout the healthcare industry could be highly challenging. Even while a company could sell an overall life-dependent commodity, this does not guarantee that the company is immediately generating profits (Latten et al., 2018). If this is never the situation, companies will be required to revise their business strategy, which might increase costs, discontinue a commodity, or even close the entire business under the most severe scenarios. Further, if the company is not making profits at a particular moment in the future, in that case, their products will become altogether inaccessible, resulting in a significantly worse outcome than when they were forced to raise their prices.
Whenever a business is profitable, it becomes more crucial to provide excellent service to its clientele than whenever it is never essential because successful companies want to keep generating a profit. On the other hand, businesses that sell things that are essential to people’s lives and create revenues are accountable for a higher obligation to look out for the interests of their customers instead of their bottom lines. Consumers desire to feel seen and acknowledged by the companies (McGruer, 2020). For example, it will be of high regard for the company to ensure that its customers have acces to a better medication that safeguards them from the risks of COVID-19 infections. Healthy clients tend to be a profit to the company in other words. Moreover, consumers expect to be cared for properly and treated with care. Customers anticipate this treatment much more whenever it explicitly relies upon the product or service.
Biblical Perspective
Look at the issue from a Biblical worldview. How would you respond if you were running such a company?
The teachings of the Bible demonstrate that people are obligated to care for each other in the same manner that they would take care of themselves. According to 1 John 3:17-18, “So whoever seems to have this planet’s commodities and finds his brother needy and locks up his entire heart from them, how can the affection of God remain within him?” Therefore, when a firm stops serving its clients, it is effectively ending people’s lives and putting the business’s requirements ahead of its clients. The Bible states that “whoever values wealth above all else will never be content with their financial situation, and this has no significance” (Ecclesiastes 5:10 NIV). This action could be disastrous for many individuals dependent on the commodity in question (Roetzel, 2019). However, the Bible shows if a business genuinely cares about its customers and is in a position to provide adequate care for customers, then the company is obligated to fulfill that obligation.
References
Aristodemou, L., &Tietze, F. (2018). The state-of-the-art on Intellectual Property Analytics (IPA): A literature review on artificial intelligence, machine learning, and deep learning methods for analyzing intellectual property (IP) data. World Patent Information, 55, 37-51.
Latten, T., Westra, D., Angeli, F., Paulus, A., Struss, M., &Ruwaard, D. (2018, February 7). Pharmaceutical companies and healthcare providers: Going beyond the gift – An explorative review. Plos One, 13(2), e0191856.
McGruer, D. (2020). Dynamic digital marketing: Master the world of online and social media marketing to grow your business. John Wiley & Sons.
Naudé, J. A., & Miller-Naudé, C. L. (2022). Alternative revisions of the American Standard Version (1901) and retranslations within the Tyndale–King James Version tradition. HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies, 78(1), 9.
Roetzel, P. G. (2019). Information overload in the information age: a review of the literature from business administration, business psychology, and related disciplines with a bibliometric approach and framework development. Business Research, 12(2), 479-522.
Sánchez-Rebull, M. V., Rudchenko, V., & MartĂn, J. C. (2018). The antecedents and consequences of customer satisfaction in tourism: a systematic literature review. Tourism and Hospitality Management, 24(1), 151-183.