Introduction
The necessity of expanding market share of a business drives innovations. In this light, innovations ensure that a company develops new products that maintain their customer’s preference to the company. In addition, innovations enable the company to produce unique goods that please their clients. Therefore, the company becomes competitive than their competitors.
Moreover, companies that are innovative ensure that they curb and eliminate the problems of poor quality. For example, the field of technology uses innovations as a way of solving the technological problems for their products. In this case, they seek to discover new technology that is more efficient than the previous one. However, the companies must protect their innovations against infringement.
The companies should ensure that they own their innovations and deter other companies from using them. In this light, they seek to remain unique and outstanding. This paper will focus on the BlackBerry Company has protected its innovations.
The paper seeks to determine how the BlackBerry Company has used the theory of protecting innovations in its organizations. Particularly, it will consider the use of trademarks, patents and trade secrets. Also, it will focus on the enforcement of laws against companies that infringe their innovations.
Trademarks
The trademarks are registered through the legal channels of government. Once they are registered, they guard and secure the international rights of ownership. The BlackBerry Company has used the trademarks widely. The company’s trademarks are registered with the US government. In this case, it has registered about forty one trademarks within its organization.
They range from software trademarks, storefront, devices, smartphones trademarks and others. Some of these trademarks include BBM, BlackBerry, Data Flow, BlackBerry Bold, and Data Smart among others. The trademark must indicate that it is registered on legal terms of the government system. In this light, the company has given some guidelines that direct the use of their trademarks.
The guidelines apply for all marks that appear in the trademarks list. They restrict the use of BlackBerry trademarks by any individual or company without a formal authorization from BlackBerry. In addition, they provide that a company should not use a mark that is similar to the company’s trademarks. In this light, they seek to prevent product dilution. Product dilution is the use of a mark that is similar to the original one.
As a result, the use of a similar trademark sets the company at an advantage of using the popularity of the original company. In addition, the customers who cannot afford the original product find for a similar product from other companies. This ensures that they get satisfaction at a lower price than the original one. Therefore, this guideline has ensured that the company protects its products against dilution.
However, they have allowed the use of their trademarks in various situations. First, a person can use the BlackBerry trademarks when referring to some statements that are true to their product or services. In this case, they have allowed individuals and companies to use the trademarks for making statements that are true to the product only. Therefore, they protect their products by restricting false allegations.
Therefore, they ensure that the credibility of their products is maintained and sustained. Otherwise, some people would compromise the credibility of the company. Secondly, they allow the use of their trademarks while showing compatibility. In this light, they allow individuals and companies to use their trademarks while showing that their products are compatible with the BlackBerry product.
For example, a software company can refer to the Blackberry’s product showing that their software can operate on a BlackBerry device. In this case, the compatibility is a positive contribution to the company. Therefore, allowing the use of the trademarks on this situation protect and support their business prosperity. However, the reference should not portray a sense of force sponsorship or endorsement by the company.
This guideline ensures that the companies competing with the referrer do not deviate from the BlackBerry Company. This forms another point of protection of their innovations. It ensures that their innovations are not only protected against infringement but also against unnecessary biases.
Lastly, the BlackBerry Company has provided that their trademarks should be used as adjectives only. Then, the trademarks should be followed by an appropriate generic name. For example, BlackBerry Smartphone or the BlackBerry Enterprise Server. This helps in suggesting that the company has many innovations that originate from the BlackBerry Company.
In addition, the trademarks must be presented in the right and exact specifications that the company has provided. The spelling and spacing should be made in the right specifications. None of the marks should be altered for any reason. This ensures that the company remains unique to the market and specific to the customers. This shows that the company has used the trademarks widely.
Patents
Patents refers to the legal rights provided by the government to the innovator allowing them to sell and distributetheir products. In this light, the government restricts any other company or individuals from distributing the company’s products and innovations without the authorization of the original company.
The BlackBerry Company has a detailed patent rights. In this case, the company has registered for patents on all its products they have made originally. These include their software, devices, applications and smartphones. In this light, their patents rights provide that the company can sue a company for selling their products without their permission.
Under the patent rights, the company has submitted the list of their inventions. Therefore, the government acknowledges the products that company own. This allows the company to have the legal power over their products.
Among many, the government has offered crucial patents to the company. First, the government offered a multi patent to the company on the innovation of more efficient cell phones and electronic devices that enhance communication. This patent was given on the basis of producing the BlackBerry smartphones and tablets. It aimed at protecting the distribution of the company’s electronic devices.
Secondly, it was awarded the patent concerning the program that aimed at reducing cyber-attacks and bullying on the social networks. In this light, the company has developed a new system of controlling cyber bullying. This system cannot be distributed by any other company or individuals without the company’s permission. This patent has helped the company on protecting their innovation concerning this system.
Another patent offered to the company was the storage of fingerprints on the BlackBerry touchscreen. This was an original invention by the BlackBerry Company which is patented under their company.
In addition, the company has a patent that protects reserves their rights of owning a system which seeks to sell and distribute digital writings and contents. Lastly, the BlackBerry Company has been given a patent on their system that converts text to audio. It allows their users to convert textual information to audio format for listening.
Trade Secrets
According to protection innovations, trade secrets refers to the information that a company does not disclose to other statutes and stakeholders. The BlackBerry Company has various trade secrets that aim at protecting their innovations and discoveries.
For example, the company has restricted the access of local servers that host the company’s services. This ensures that most of the trade information remains confidential to the company. As a result, they conceal their innovations strategies that can be used to produce a similar product. As a result, the company will maintain the originality of their products and the capability to improve the technology.
In this light, the ability to improve the products is a crucial factor in the solvency of a company. If the company allows the access of information, other companies can improve the technology and reduce the marketability of the original product. Therefore, BlackBerry Company ensures that it retains the ability to improve their products.
Conclusion
In this paper, the theory of innovation protection has been applied to the BlackBerry Company. In this light, the paper has focused on the three most significant pillars of the theory. These pillars include the use of trademarks, patents and trade secrets.
It has portrayed the manner in which the company has applied each of the factors in their organizational strategies. In addition, it has formed the framework of protecting innovations in the future. As a result, it is an all-inclusive and a satisfactory application of the theory.