What intellectual property would your final project business own?

Intellectual Property are rights that are given to people who create by design, work, or invention. This can then be patented, copyrighted or trademarked. This is seen In the hospitality industry, particularly at our location The Peninsula in Chicago. We have our trademarks, trade secrets and, copyrights.

A trademark is a sign, design, or expression that can be recognizable and identifies to a product and or services. This may also be seen through specific brands. At our company - The Peninsula, our name, and logo design are the most significant trademarks we manifest. This differentiates us from other hotels. When someone hears the name The Peninsula, or sees our logo, they immediately interpret the highly fond reputation the brand has and its worldly success.

Another trademark that defines us is the classic white uniforms our employees all around the world wear as their work attire. Not only is the white uniform symbolic to workers, The Peninsula even dresses a bear in the signature white uniforms. This is highly pleasing to children staying at the hotel. It gives the families a sense of comfort knowing they are also being taken into consideration. Furthermore, the culture of the Peninsula also gives complimentary stays to children!

Lastly, another trademark we have is our vehicles. When a guests purchases a suite they are able to use our vehicles upon availability. We have such luxury vehicles as Rolls Royce at our Beijing location. However, The Peninsula Chicago and New York,  provide our guests with complimentary Mini Coopers car service for up to three hours over their stay. This is a unique touch we demonstrate to make our guests feel like real first class guests when staying at any of our properties. To protect our trademarks, we filed a trademark application in trademark offices of each country where our properties are located.

Copyright is a legal right that gives the creator of an original work exclusive rights for its use and distribution. At The Peninsula, we have a few copyrights which would be protected under the copyright law. This includes: our website, advertisements, unique operations system, The “Peninsula Standards” and lastly, the collected databases.

How would you prioritize the value of various items of intellectual property?

There are eight various items to Intellectual Property. During our class trip to Saper Law, our host, Daliah Saper gave us a few thoughts on what she said is the most crucial to least crucial for Intellectual Property.We also considered what is vital for The Peninsula.

1.Company Name

2.Trademarks

3.Copyrights

4.Business Plan

5.Social Media Accounts

  6.Internet Domain Name

7.Patents

8.Trade Secrets

We picked this list considering what we believe are the most important and influential parts of our brand and company. We also ranked it to what we found least valuable. Numbers 8 and seven are considered the least important. As a hotel chain, we do not have any real trade secrets. Patents are not too relevant since we are not creating anything new. If we were bringing new products or technology, it would be prioritized higher.Numbers 6 and five, could coincide with each other; the reason is that we are moving into a more technological world every day - and a presence online is essential for all brands to grow.  

Numbers 4 to 1 are the most important for us, as they are what truly define the culture of The Peninsula. The final four items (business plan, copyright, trademark and company name) are so beneficial, that without them - we would not be able to direct ourselves into being one of the largest brands as we are

known for today.

Looking back at chapter 3 on attorney selection, would Saper be a good law firm for your business; why or why not?

In our groups point of view, we believe that the Saper Law firm would not be suitable for the Peninsula,Chicago. The reason being is that we see Saper Law as a smaller firm that is more focused on the individual clients and their small companies rather than larger companies and properties like the Peninsula. We agreed that we would go with a larger law firm with experience dealing with hotels and the hospitality industry. We would then sign the firm we choose on a retainer basis. This is because we are

continually dealing with contracts that we need to be looked over and created. We also feel that having a firm on retainer allows having breathing room that we know whenever we need them they are just a call away.