In principle, the patent owner has the exclusive right to prevent or stop others from commercially exploiting the patented invention. In other words, patent protection means that the invention cannot be commercially made, used, distributed, imported or sold by others without the patent owner's consent.

Patents are territorial rights. In general, the exclusive rights are only applicable in the country or region in which a patent has been filed and granted, in accordance with the law of that country or region.

The protection is granted for a limited period, generally 20 years from the filing date of the application

Patents may be granted for inventions in any field of technology, from an everyday kitchen utensil to a nanotechnology chip. An invention can be a product – such as a chemical compound, or a process, for example – or a process for producing a specific chemical compound. Many products in fact contain a number of inventions. For example, a laptop computer can involve hundreds of inventions, working together.

Patent rights are usually enforced in a court on the initiative of the right owner. In most systems a court of law has the authority to stop patent infringement. However the main responsibility for monitoring, identifying, and taking action against infringers of a patent lies with the patent owner.

Licensing a patent simply means that the patent owner grants permission to another individual/organization to make, use, sell etc. his/her patented invention. This takes place according to agreed terms and conditions (for example, defining the amount and type of payment to be made by the licensee to the licensor), for a defined purpose, in a defined territory, and for an agreed period of time.

A patent owner may grant a license to a third party for many reasons. The patent owner may not have the necessary manufacturing facilities, for example, and therefore opts to allow others to make and sell his/her patented invention in return for “royalty” payments. Alternatively, a patent owner may have manufacturing facilities, but they may not be large enough to cover market demand. In this case, he/she may be interested in licensing the patent to another manufacturer in order to benefit from another income stream. Another possible situation is one in which the patent owner wishes to concentrate on one geographic market; therefore the patent owner may choose to grant a license to another individual/organization, with interests in other geographical markets. Entering into a licensing agreement can help to build a mutually-beneficial business relationship.

Unlike selling or transferring a patent to another party, the licensor continue to have property rights over the patented invention.

Patented inventions have, in fact, pervaded every aspect of human life, from electric lighting (patents held by Edison and Swan) and plastic (patents held by Baekeland), to ballpoint pens (patents held by Biro), and microprocessors (patents held by Intel, for example).

Patents provide incentives to and protection for individuals by offering them recognition for their creativity and the possibility of material reward for their inventions. At the same time, the obligatory publication of patents and patent applications facilitates the mutually-beneficial spread of new knowledge and accelerates innovation activities by, for example, avoiding the necessity to “re-invent the wheel”.

Once knowledge is publicly available, by its nature, it can be used simultaneously by an unlimited number of persons. While this is, without doubt, perfectly acceptable for public information, it causes a dilemma for the commercialization of technical knowledge. In the absence of protection of such knowledge, “free-riders” could easily use technical knowledge embedded in inventions without any recognition of the creativity of the inventor or contribution to the investments made by the inventor. As a consequence, inventors would naturally be discouraged to bring new inventions to the market, and tend to keep their commercially valuable inventions secret. A patent system intends to correct such under-provision of innovative activities by providing innovators with limited exclusive rights, thereby giving the innovators the possibility to receive appropriate returns on their innovative activities.

In a wider sense, the public disclosure of the technical knowledge in the patent, and the exclusive right granted by the patent, provide incentives for competitors to search for alternative solutions and to “invent around” the first invention. These incentives and the dissemination of knowledge about new inventions encourage further innovation, which assures that the quality of human life and the well-being of society is continuously enhanced.

This is common question being asked many times by inventors in hope of judging whether it is really worth to go for filing patent for the invention.

Before answering this question, I would ask what are the advantages of having a real estate property on your name?

• You can rent it
• You can sell it
• You can stop others from using it without your permission
• You can use it for your purpose (business or residence)

on similar terms, patent is an intellectual property and has all the advantages stated above, but you need to claim it to be on your name, hence the filing of patent application for your invention. There is a difference though, Unlike real estate the patent has the term of 20 years of ownership. after that they are open to be used by anyone. Hence the Patents system are built to encourage the innovation and growth of the economy be providing patent winner and exclusive right on the invention (intellectual property) for limited time.

Advantages of owning patent would be:

• You own the invention for given time (20 years)
• You can use it to build a business
• Rent it (in this case license it) to existing businesses
• Exclude all others for using, selling, offering for sale and importing your invention in your country
• You can completely sell the patent to other company

hence this gives a advantage to patent owner which can be leveraged for:

1. Building business around the invention
2. Having patent helps in raising capital for business
3. Patent rights can be licensed to other companies to receive royalty payments
4. You can sell the patent
5. Being owner of the patent you have rights to block others from
   • making,
   • using,
   • selling or offering for sale, and
   • importing the patented invention
6. Thus businesses and inventors can have a complete monopoly and competitive advantage

As a research student, you need to be very careful that you are not putting all of your efforts in something which is already invented and patented. If that becomes the case, you would be re inventing wheel and probably all your research efforts are not worth whole a lot. Having said that, we have also seen many people working on particular invention gets discouraged up on finding hundreds and thousands of patent from their domain and similar to their technology...

Getting patent is NOT always about inventing something earth breaking solution !!! even small solution solving problems in existing (known) technology can win patent.

Many patents are awarded for inventions that are either

• technically advance or
• significant to the existing patents (or prior art)

So, a prior art documents or patents that are already existing can be 99% similar to your invention Yet, if your invention has either technical advance or economic significance or both... and you can prove it that your invention is better than existing ones by means of results comparisons testing and if possible working model, then there is a strong possibility that you may get patent for your invention.

The best way to go about making this decision is get help from patent agent and patent attorneys.

The novelty search (also called as patentability search) is performed for the same reason, This patentability search, done right, can yield pretty fantastic results for your invention;

• It can tell you what part of your invention is already covered and what could be novelty feature…
• it can tell you where you can focus you research work to get maximum level of protection with you patent
• and it gives a review about whether it is appropriate to proceed with patent filing process

for more information or to get answer to questions about your invention reach patent attorneys and patent agents here.

This is most common question raised in minds of anyone who becomes interested in knowing about patent in India and protecting the invention. This question comes from every sector and domain imaginable. You may be

• Business owner : with an idea or product to patent
• Research Scientist : with a new concept, formula to patent
• Professional (employee) : with new idea for software or business method
• ME or PHD holder : with research project to patent
• Student : with intent to learn more about patents and how they can protect your ideas

The word “patent” continues to be most sought after word in business and Research and development community that is being searched over internet for more information and guidance... Possibly, you are influenced by reading about a patent related news and influenced by the idea of owning intellectual property right for invention, And you are trying to find information on

• What is patent?
• Is my idea patentable?
• How to apply for patent in India?
• much it costs to get patent in India ?

You can read this information at many places online, in blogs, from government website on patent and from books. Yet it is not always easy to understand for every one coming from different background and different mindset. Moreover, many times questions like these may not have straight forward answers. Like any other law, Patent Law also involves certain degree of complexity.

So the best advice would be...

Get patent professional involved for writing and filing patent.

You would be amazed to find out the value added by a professional patent agent or patent attorney when working on your idea and filing patent.

Honestly saying, there are some inventors who have written their patents on their own, with unbelievable quality of balancing technical and legal aspects of patent, that it astonishes even experienced patent professionals. But this is rare case, more often than not people need professional help since patent is not only a technical document... it is a techno - legal document. Having an experienced patent professional (patent agent) guiding you through the process of getting your invention patented can make a large impact to an extent of patent granted or patent rejected.

You can quickly find out how much it cost to get patent in India by reading this guideline on patent costs.

Step 1: Write down the invention (idea or concept) with as much details as possible

Collect all the information about your invention such as:

• Area of invention
• Description of the invention what it does
• How does it work
• Advantages of the invention

Ideally, if you have worked on the invention during research and development phase you should have something call lab record duly signed with date by you and respective authority.

Step 2: include drawings, diagrams or sketches explaining working of invention

The drawings and diagrams should be designed so as to explain the working of the invention in better way with visual illustrations. They play an important role in patent application.

Step 3: check whether the invention is patentable subject matter

All inventions may not be patentable, as per Indian patent act there are certain inventions that are not patentable explained in detail in(inventions not patentable)

Step 4a: Patentability search

The next step would be finding out whether your invention meets all patentability criteria as per Indian patent act? That is,

• Novelty
• Non-obviousness
• Industrial application
• Enabling

The detailed explanation for patentability criteria is given here (what are patentability criteria’s). The patentability opinion is provided by the patent professionals up on conducting extensive search and forming patentability report.

Step 4b: Decide whether to go ahead with patent

The patentability report and opinion helps you decide whether to go ahead with the patent or not, chances are what you thought as novel might already been patented or know to public in some form of information. Hence this reports saves lots of time, efforts and cost of the inventor by helping him decide whether to go ahead with the patent filing process or not.

Step 5: Draft (write) patent application

In case you are at very early stage in the research and development for your invention, then you can go for provisional application. It gives following benefits:

• Secures filing date
• 12 months of time to file complete specification
• Low cost

After filing provisional application, you secure the filing date which is very crucial in patent world. You get 12 months of time to come up with the complete specification, up on expiry of 12 months your patent application will be abandoned.

When you complete the required documents and your research work is at level where you can have prototype and experimental results to prove your inventive step you can file complete specification with patent application.

Filing the provisional specification is the optional step, if you are at the stage where you have complete information about your invention then you can directly go for complete specification.

Step 6: Publication of the application

Up on filing the complete specification along with application for patent, the application is published after 18 months of first filing.

An early publication request can be made along with prescribed fees if you do not wish to wait till the expiry of 18 months from the date of filing for publishing your patent application. Generally the patent application is published within a month form request form early publication.

Step 7: Request for examination

The patent application is examined only after receiving request for examination that is RFE. Up on receiving this request the controller gives your patent application to a patent examiner who examines the patent application with different patentability criteria like:

• Patentable subject matter
• Novelty
• Non-obviousness
• Inventive step
• Industrial application
• Enabling

The examiner creates a first examination report of the patent application upon reviewing it for above terms. This is called patent prosecution. Everything happening to patent application before grant of patent is generally called as patent prosecution.

The first examination report submitted to controller by examiner generally contains prior arts (existing documents before the date of filing) which are similar to the claimed invention, and same is reported to patent applicant.

Step 8: respond to objections

Majority of patent applicants will receive some type of objections based on examination report. The best thing to do it analyse the examination report with patent professional (patent agent) and creating a response to the objections raised in the examination report.

This is a chance for an inventor to communicate his novelty over prior arts found in the examination report. The inventor and patent agent create and send a response to the examination that tries to prove to controller that his invention is indeed patentable and satisfies all patentability criteria.

Step 9: clearing all objections

This communication between controller and patent applicant is to ensure that all objections raised in the patent application are resolved. (if not the patent will not be granted ) and the inventor has his fair chance to prove his point and establish novelty and inventive step over existing prior arts.

Up on finding the patent application in order of grant, it is grant to the patent applicant as early as possible.

Step 10: Grant of patent

The application would be placed in order for grant once it is found to be meeting all patentability requirements. The grant of patent is notified in the patent journal which is published time to time.

What is a patent? What are the benefits of patent registration? Several such questions strike the mind of an inventor when he comes up with new ideas and tries to associate them with patenting. A patent is one of the many exclusive forms of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) granted to an inventor for the unique invention by his nation’s government. Intended to prevent others from copying, trading, modifying, or importing the inventors’ ideas without their consent, patent protection continues for years. Patent Law is territorial bound and thus, different for different countries, for example – the patent granted in India lasts for 20 years from the date of filing. Note that anyone can use the invention after this duration. Once the applicant gets a patent, he can enjoy many benefits.

Patent law develops the inventor’s confidence to generate more ideas by making him the only owner of his invention. Comparatively different from other kinds of Intellectual Property (IP), patent rights can be bought, licensed, or sold. Since these rights are country-specific, the patent law of one nation gives the rights valid within that country only. For instance – the patent granted in India gives rights that prevent unauthorized users from infringing, i.e., importing or using others’ ideas within Indian Territory. Besides inventors, the patent system benefits the nation by growing its economy, as it enables the public to get the desired products and services at affordable prices.

There are a lot of benefits that the owner can enjoy after obtaining a patent, some of which are as follows:

1. Exclusive access to every right from the time of early filing

   Patent registration begins bestowing the inventors with the benefits right from the first step, i.e., the time of filing for the patent. The applicant gets the security and surety that no other person or company could claim the ideas similar to his invention, as soon as he files the Provisional Patent Application. If someone else applies for the same patent, his request will get rejected for the filing period, which is 12 months in India.

2. Freedom to make changes

   The patent law entitles the owner to use his ideas in any way for the permitted period. It means that the owner owns full freedom to utilize, sell, or even modify the original invention and to prevent others from making profits from the same ideas without his consent. With the granted patent, the inventor gets the ability to sue the user whom he finds infringing his patent rights. Note that patent infringement is a criminal offense.

3. ROI (Return on Investment)

   Sometimes, the owner finds that his invention is not bringing good outcomes for him and therefore, wants to hand it over to any other deserving or successful person. Once obtained, the patent rights allow him to earn a good amount of ROI, i.e., returns on his investments by commercializing the invention.

4. Opportunities to get a good market reputation

   Patent rights enable the inventor to get a noticeable market status and improve his portfolio by uncovering the invention publicly. It then helps him in building up a good relationship with consumers and competitors that ultimately add to his revenue.

5. Public disclosure

   Patent rights allow public disclosure that helps the inventor in building up his portfolio along with increasing the funds, market value, and business partners. Sharing information that pertains to the invention publicly will demonstrate the inventors’ specialization and good command over the technical subject-matter. All these facts benefit the owner by attracting leading and high-end investors, shareholders, business partners, and consumers.

If the invention is not patented, then it becomes difficult for the owner to prevent others from stealing and using his ideas to obtain all the above-given benefits. After reading the above-provided information, you can easily conclude that for getting a patent, the inventor should be familiar with the IP industry, patent laws, market scenario, competitors, consumers, etc. The inventor needs to remain cautious as well as up-to-date in regards to patent standards and required documents. However, the process of patent registration may appear a bit arduous, but earning protection for your invention for a certain period is worthy.

A simple answer however is, anything that qualifies to be an invention can have a patent granted to it. In the above answer, the word “invention” is the key word that requires definition.

In US, any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof may have a patent granted to it, provided it satisfies all other requirements of patentability.

In India, an invention means a new product or a new process that involves technological advancement and/or has economic significance, which makes that new product or process non-obvious to a person who is skilled in the technology to which the product or process belongs. Additionally, the new product or process should be capable of being made or used in an industry for it to qualify as an invention.

Most of the patent offices provide a simple definition of the word invention. However, they also provide a list of exclusions, which are not considered as inventions. This list is the one that often stirs up debates.

The following are not inventions under Section 3 within the meaning of The Patent Act,1970 —

1. an invention which is frivolous or which claims anything obviously contrary to well established natural laws;
2. an invention the primary or intended use or commercial exploitation of which could be contrary to public order or morality or which causes serious prejudice to human, animal or plant life or health or to the environment;
3. the mere discovery of a scientific principle or the formulation of an abstract theory or discovery of any living thing or non-living substance occurring in nature;
4. the mere discovery of a new form of a known substance which does not result in the enhancement of the known efficacy of that substance or the mere discovery of any new property or new use for a known substance or of the mere use of a known process, machine or apparatus unless such known process results in a new product or employs at least one new reactant. Explanation.—For the purposes of this clause, salts, esters, ethers, polymorphs, metabolites, pure form, particle size, isomers, mixtures of isomers, complexes, combinations and other derivatives of known substance shall be considered to be the same substance, unless they differ significantly in properties with regard to efficacy;
5. a substance obtained by a mere admixture resulting only in the aggregation of the properties of the components thereof or a process for producing such substance;
6. the mere arrangement or re-arrangement or duplication of known devices each functioning independently of one another in a known way;
7. ..(omitted)
8. a method of agriculture or horticulture;
9. any process for the medicinal, surgical, curative, prophylactic diagnostic, therapeutic or other treatment of human beings or any process for a similar treatment of animals to render them free of disease or to increase their economic value or that of their products.
10. plants and animals in whole or any part thereof other than micro¬ organisms but including seeds, varieties and species and essentially biological processes for production or propagation of plants and animals;
11. a mathematical or business method or a computer programme per se or algorithms;
12. a literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work or any other aesthetic creation whatsoever including cinematographic works and television productions;
13. a mere scheme or rule or method of performing mental act or method of playing game;
14. a presentation of information;
15. topography of integrated circuits;
16. an invention which in effect, is traditional knowledge or which is an aggregation or duplication of known properties of traditionally known component or components.

The following are not inventions under Section 4 within the meaning of The Patent Act, 1970 —

No patent shall be granted in respect of an invention relating to atomic energy falling within sub-section (1) of section 20 of the Atomic Energy Act, 1962 (33 of 1962)

It has been a common misconception that, a patent application is queued for examination after it is filed at the Indian Patent Office (IPO). In India, filing a patent application does not essentially mean that an Applicant for the patent is requesting the IPO to examine his patent application. In fact, the Applicant can refrain from filing a request for examining his application up to 48 months from the filing date of the Indian patent application.

It shall be noted that, if the Indian patent application is claiming priority from a corresponding patent application filed in a convention country or a PCT application, then the 48 month duration is calculated from the priority date of the Indian patent application.

In light of the above discussion, it is certain that, unless a request for examination is filed, the patent application will not be queued for examination. Having said that, by no means are we saying that just because an examination request has been filed, the patent application will be queued for examination.

A second criterion has to be satisfied as well for the application to be queued for examination, and the second criterion is publication of the patent application. The patent application is published after 18 months from the date of filing the Indian patent application, unless an early publication request is filed. In case an early publication request is filed, then the patent application is normally published within 1 month from the date of filing such a request.

We can summarize the above content by mentioning that, a patent application will be queued for examination after both the below listed criteria are satisfied:

• The patent application has been published
• A request for examination of the patent application has been made

In case the Indian patent application is a national phase application, then the Indian patent application will be queued for examination after all the three below listed criteria are satisfied:

• The patent application has been published
• A request for examination of the patent application has been made
• 31 months has passed from the priority date of the Indian patent application, unless “express” request for examination is filed.

The Indian patent office has introduced an expedited examination of patent applications, which is applicable if certain criteria are met.

The above mentioned are the criteria for the patent application to be queued for examination. Once queued, it can take a considerable amount of time, at least 2 years, to receive an examination report from the IPO.

In order to expedite the patenting process in India, it is advisable to satisfy the above listed criteria as soon as possible.

The following persons are entitled to apply for patents under Section 6 within the meaning of The Patent Act,1970 —

1. Subject to the provisions contained in section 134, an application for a patent for an invention may be made by any of the following persons, that is to say,—
   1. by any person claiming to be the true and first inventor of the invention;
   2. by any person being the assignee of the person claiming to be the true and first inventor in respect of the right to make such an application;
   3. by the legal representative of any deceased person who immediately before his death was entitled to make such an application.
2. An application under sub-section (1) may be made by any of the persons referred to therein either alone or jointly with any other person.

Patent infringement happens when a third party uses, sells, manufactures or imports patented products or technology without the permission from the patent owner. For infringement to occur, the prohibited activity also has to happen:

• while the patent is valid
• within the country where the patent is in force

If you have a valid patent and suspect that someone stole or copied your invention, you can bring an enforcement action in court to prevent future infringement and/or seek damages.

Resolving patent disputes out of court

Many cases of infringement occur unintentionally. If you suspect infringement, it may be worth taking a considered approach to resolve the issues amicably or settle out of court. You can:

• send a cease-and-desist letter to the infringing party outlining your legal position
• negotiate a licensing agreement

An IP adviser or a patent attorney can help you to analyze the situation and suggest the best course of action for resolving patent disputes.

If you are unable to settle the issue informally, there are two alternatives available:

• mediation - the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) offers IP mediation services
• patent opinion service - the IPO can issue an impartial opinion on validity or infringement of patents

Although the opinion is not binding, it can help to resolve issues without going to court.

Patent infringement action

If you are unable to reach an agreement out of court, you can try to resolve disputes through civil law litigation. This should usually be a last resort. Litigation costs can be prohibitively high and you will have the burden of proving infringement.

There are no specialized patent courts in INDIA. To initiate legal proceedings, you can file a claim either through the IPO or through the High Court in India (if your claim is complex or valuable). You can file some type of proceedings only through one or the other.

Remedies for patent infringement

Successful patent enforcement action usually results in one of two legal remedies:

• an injunction to stop infringing activities
• monetary damages award which can be substantial

The court will typically expect you to have tried alternative means of dispute resolution before pursuing litigation.

Bringing an action for patent infringement is complicated. If you need to enforce your patent rights, you should seek professional or legal assistance.

The top three advantages of patents are:

1. You get 20 years of exclusivity (protection) for your invention, meaning no one else in the INDIA (or in which country you have patent right) can make, use, distributed, sell, or import your invention without your permission.
2. You have the ability to transfer, license, or sell your patent, just like you would a real estate property.
3. You don’t have to keep it a secret like you would with a Trade Secret!

Trade secrets are essentially of two kinds. On the one hand, trade secrets may concern inventions or manufacturing processes that do not meet the patentability criteria and therefore can only be protected as trade secrets. This would be the case of customer’s lists or manufacturing processes that are not sufficiently inventive to be granted a patent (though they may qualify for protection as a utility model). On the other hand, trade secrets may concern inventions that would fulfill the patentability criteria and could therefore be protected by patents. In the latter case, the SME will face a choice: to patent the invention or to keep it as a trade secret.

Some advantages of trade secrets include:

• Trade secret protection has the advantage of not being limited in time (patents last in general for up to 20 years). It may therefore continue indefinitely as long as the secret is not revealed to the public.
• Trade secrets involve no registration costs (though there may be high costs related to keeping the information confidential).
• Trade secrets have immediate effect.
• Trade secret protection does not require compliance with formalities such as disclosure of the information to a Government authority.

There are, however, some concrete disadvantages of protecting confidential business information as a trade secret, especially when the information meets the criteria for patentability:

• If the secret is embodied in an innovative product, others may be able to inspect it, dissect it and analyze it (i.e. "reverse engineer" it) and discover the secret and be thereafter entitled to use it. Trade secret protection of an invention in fact does not provide the exclusive right to exclude third parties from making commercial use of it. Only patents and utility models can provide this type of protection.
• Once the secret is made public, anyone may have access to it and use it at will.
• A trade secret is more difficult to enforce than a patent. The level of protection granted to trade secrets varies significantly from country to country, but is generally considered weak, particularly when compared with the protection granted by a patent.
• A trade secret may be patented by someone else who developed the relevant information by legitimate means.

Contrary to patents, trade secrets are protected without registration, that is, trade secrets are protected without any procedural formalities. Consequently, a trade secret can be protected for an unlimited period of time. For these reasons, the protection of trade secrets may appear to be particularly attractive for SMEs. There are, however, some conditions for the information to be considered a trade secret. Compliance with such conditions may turn out to be more difficult and costly than it would appear at first glance. While these conditions vary from country to country, some general standards exist which are referred to in Art. 39 of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS Agreement):

• The information must be secret (i.e. it is not generally known among, or readily accessible to, circles that normally deal with the kind of information in question).
• It must have commercial value because it is a secret.
• It must have been subject to reasonable steps by the rightful holder of the information to keep it secret (e.g., through confidentiality agreements).

Example An SME develops a process for the manufacturing of its products that allows it to produce its goods in a more cost-effective manner. Such a process provides the enterprise a competitive edge over its competitors. The enterprise in question may therefore value its know-how as a trade secret and would not want competitors to learn about it. It makes sure that only a limited number of people know the secret, and those who know it are made well aware that it is confidential. When dealing with third parties or licensing its know-how, the enterprise signs confidentiality agreements to ensure that all parties know that the information is a secret. In such circumstances, the misappropriation of the information by a competitor or by any third party would be considered a violation of the enterprise's trade secrets.

Precautionary Measures to be Taken by Your SME

Trade secrets are widely used by SMEs. In fact, many SMEs rely almost exclusively on trade secrets for the protection of their IP (although in many cases they may not even be aware that trade secrets are legally protected). It is important, therefore, to make sure that enterprises take all necessary measures to protect their trade secrets effectively. This includes:

• Firstly, considering whether the secret is patentable and, if so, whether it would not be better protected by a patent.
• Secondly, making sure that a limited number of people know the secret and that all those who do are well aware that it is confidential information.
• Thirdly, including confidentiality agreements within employees' contracts. Under the law of many countries, however, employees owe confidentiality to their employer even without such agreements. The duty to maintain confidentiality on the employer's secrets generally remains, at least for a certain period of time, even after the employee has left the employment.
• Fourthly, signing confidentiality agreements with business partners whenever disclosing confidential information.

This is the answer to question 22.