Successful businesses are leveraging IA/IP to differentiate themselves from their competitors. IA/IP is widely viewed as the driving force in a company for greater innovation in areas such as design, marketing or production. It is also an engine for growth as the company can harness its IA/IP to generate substantial revenue. Some examples are:

• franchising of business formats. E.g. Ya Kun Kaya Toast's franchise.
  

• licensing technology. E.g. Trek 2000 has licensed its USB flash drive solution.
  

• licensing content characters. E.g. 'Katakune', a 3D-animated series for children about a seven-year-old silkworm, was sold to CCTV in China and televised in 2006. Singapore company Character Farm owns the registered trade mark of ""Katakune"" and has since licensed it for merchandise.
  

• other forms of commercialisation by making use of knowledge gained. E.g. Adam Khoo, a renowned motivational speaker, gives seminars and workshops and publishes books on various topics on self-improvement.
  
  

Hence, even if your competitor can copy ideas from one of your products, it is not able to replicate your entire robust system to manage human resource, innovation and IP commercialisation when it is well protected.

Proper deployment of IP management (IPM) can help to bring about good reputation, revenue and market share to the company.