The Innovation & Technology Service of Regenerate Pennine Lancashire can assist small businesses, inventors, designers, suppliers and manufacturers develop their ideas from concept through to the marketplace. The Innovation & Technology Service also provides assistance in choosing the correct supplier, finding the best route to market for your product and also give expect advice on legal issues concerning intellectual property.

For more information on Intellectual Property or other related product development issues please use the links below:

Intellectual Property

Intellectual property (IP) can allow you to own things you create in a similar way to owning physical property. You can control the use of your IP, and use it to gain reward. This encourages further innovation and creativity.

The three main types of IP are:

Copyright

Copyright protects material such as publishing photographs on the internet to making a sound recording.

Patents

A patent protects the technical and functional aspect of products and processes.

Trademarks

Trademarks protect distinctive signs and symbols which are used to identify the source of a product/service.

Prototyping

Prototyping is the process of building a model of a system. Prototyping is an iterative process that is part of the development life cycle. There are two main types of Prototyping:

Rapid Prototyping

Rapid Prototyping is the automatic construction of physical objects using computer software programs.

Conventional Prototyping

Conventional Prototyping is the process of actually creating a mock-up of a product to evaluate features, size, materials and weight.

Accreditation

Accreditation is the independent evaluation of a company to confirm it meets specific requirements.