Intellectual Property

Using Northern Health and Social Care Trust Intellectual Property

Terms and Conditions

What is intellectual property?

Having the right type of intellectual property protection helps you to stop people stealing or copying:

• names of our products or brands
• inventions
• the design or look of our products
• things we have written, made or produced

Copyright, patents, designs and trade marks are all types of intellectual property protection. You get some types of protection automatically, others you have to apply for.

Intellectual property is something that you create using your mind – for example, a story, an invention, an artistic work or a symbol.

Owning intellectual property

Our intellectual property exists because:

• We have created something within the Northern Health and Social Care Trust (and it meets the requirements for copyright, a patent or a design)
• We have bought the rights from the creator or a previous owner
• We have developed a brand that could be a trade mark, for example, a well-known product name

All our intellectual property has been registered; this will be indicated by its copyright or trade mark, and therefore cannot be used without our permission.

Do you want to use our Intellectual Property?

You can usually get permission to use someone else’s intellectual property (IP) by asking for permission or buying the rights.

Using someone’s trade mark, patent, copyright or design without their permission is known as ‘IP infringement’ and could lead to a fine, prison or both.

Read about IP crime and enforcement for more information on the penalties by visiting  https://www.gov.uk/using-somebody-elses-intellectual-property