IP Resources

Securing a patent from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office ensures that others cannot make, use, or sell your intellectual property without your permission. Patents can be awarded to a material, a new use of an existing material, a process or method, or an improvement to any of these—so long as it can be demonstrated that the material, process, method, etc. is useful, not previously known, and not obvious to other professionals in the field.

Not every discovery—even those that can be successfully commercialized—requires a patent, though. There are complex legal requirements that determine whether an invention is patentable, which should be addressed by an experienced patent attorney. IU employs in-house and external patent counsel to ensure exemplary patent strategy, drafting, and prosecution.

Copyrights typically apply to works of art, books, software, and other intellectual property that may be easily reproduced. Copyright exists the moment the work is created. IU may register copyrights with the U.S. Copyright Office before licensing them, but registration is not necessary in the early stages of commercialization.

IU owns the patentable intellectual property created by anyone using university resources, including individuals being paid through IU, using funding administered through IU, or using university laboratory space to make the invention. This includes visiting scientists and volunteers.

Copyrighted works are divided into two categories: Traditional Works of Scholarship and University Works.

Rights to Traditional Works of Scholarship, which include scholarly publications, books, and works of music and art, typically remain with the creator of the work.

IU owns University Works, which are copyrighted works that are created by nonacademic employees, funded by external grants, or commissioned by the university, or that have a funding agreement that indicates any copyrights will be considered University Works.

To be an inventor, you must contribute to the conception of the invention—that is, you must envision step-by-step how the invention might work. Carrying out someone else’s instructions, even if your efforts prove the invention works, does not qualify you as an inventor. Providing knowledge that is in the public domain—no matter how obscure or how helpful—does not qualify you as an inventor.

An author of a copyright is the person who comes up with the creative expression of an idea, not the idea itself. If you instruct someone to write a computer program to carry out a specific function, the programmer is an author, but you may or may not be, depending upon the detail of the instruction you gave to the programmer.