The perception that university-based research is removed from all worldly concerns, vulnerabilities, and threats e.g., misappropriation, infringement, economic espionage, targeting by adversary (terrorist) organizations, etc., belongs more to wishful thinking than reality.
University research and scientific communication have traditionally been a two-sided (for – against) argument about the imposition of ‘controls’ on openness and freedom of dissemination.
This post is not about keeping innovation and science out of the public domain! Rather, it’s about protecting and preserving intellectual property rights and keeping dual-use technologies out of the hands of adversaries.
Building the proverbial, but always essential ‘business case’ (rationale) for utilizing your company’s intangible assets.
With intangible assets, it may not always be a case of ‘use’em or lose’em’, but it’s always a case of ‘if you’re not using them, you’re not benefiting from them’, and that translates as lost or, at minimum, significantly reduced value, revenue, and sustainability.
A collective bottom line to the recession is that company’s are accepting increasingly higher thresholds for risks and threats and the challenge for information asset protection professionals is how much company value, reputation, image, goodwill, and IP, etc., will be eroded, de-valued, or outright lost in the interim?