The intellectual property rights system is key to protect assets of micro, small and medium enterprises. Protecting an invention is one of the key roles that intellectual property rights plays in innovative business ventures. To remain ahead of competitors, entrepreneurs must either continuously introduce innovative products and services or make improvements to the quality of existing products and services. The author of this research study found out that intellectual property rights protect innovations, encourage research and development (R&D) and boost profits of micro, small and medium enterprises, however, there are numerous challenges in the enforcement of intellectual property rights such as counterfeit products which are abundant in the Nigerian market.
It is important that SMEs assess their intellectual property and develop policies on the management of intellectual property rights to effectively and efficiently maximise the use of intellectual property rights in relation to threats from competitors. Managers sometimes use their IP rights to suppress other competitors from engaging in the production and distribution of products covered by the IP rights, thereby having the monopolistic power to raise prices of the products to increase profits. This study examines four ways managers at SMEs can adequately manage intellectual property rights which include (1) acquisition (2) exploitation (3) monitoring and (4) enforcement. One of the key conclusions of this study is that Managers should continuously check IP databases to determine the status of their intellectual property rights and whether there is any infringement on their intellectual property rights. Infringement of intellectual property rights can result to huge financial losses as a result of mass production, cheap and substandard copies of original products.
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