Resources
The Rhode Island Business Competition will take all reasonable efforts to assure that all applicants retain their rights to their business pitch decks and intellectual property, but will not sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) before accepting or reviewing pitch decks submitted to the competition. These organizations and the judges constantly work with individuals and invest in the ideas of entrepreneurs without signing NDAs.
The protection of intellectual property and the rights to the ideas contained in business pitch decks submitted are the ultimate responsibility of each applicant, and the organizers of the competition are not responsible for any proprietary information and/or intellectual property included in a business pitch deck they submit to the Rhode Island Business Competition.
Applicants are urged to mark their applications as CONFIDENTIAL. They
are also advised not to put any descriptions of technology in their
business pitch decks, which would enable the reader to duplicate the
technology or invention described. Applicants should also be careful
about disclosing any 'patentable' concepts in their applications
because, although in the United States a patent application can be filed
up to one year after the first public disclosure of an invention, this
is not necessarily the case elsewhere. In many foreign countries a
patent application must be filed before any public disclosure is made.
Resources
- www.uspto.gov - US Patent and Trademark Office; general information and search on U.S. patents.
- www.wipo.int - The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), part of the United Nations and based in Geneva, Switzerland, is responsible for the promotion of the protection of intellectual property throughout the world.