At Host, innovation plays a central role and protection is essential

The professional hospitality, which finds in the Host exhibition one of the appointments at international level, falls fully into the ranks of the business sectors in which the seller is the one who innovates and who protects its innovative result. At Host the centrality of innovation is felt at all levels, for the food with the techniques of processing and the development of advanced machinery (food equipment), into the food (at the level of management of raw materials and semi-finished ones), in the format of product presentation (packaging and advertising claims), in design and in the culture at 360 degrees of the consumption "outside the home" understood as a lifestyle. Therefore, to the companies operating in this field that are going to bring to the fair their innovation baggage it is imposed a preliminary reflection on the protection of industrial property, in typed forms of trademarks, of patents and designs, so that what which is protectable under an exclusivity regime is not acted "at the mercy" of the competition. The first evaluation is carried out by the company, which knows its market and knows what is new and potentially inventive (under patent) or liable to the gradient of creativity and distinctiveness (in the field of trademarks and design) that is needed to effectively convey the product sales. The second evaluation, especially for technological and aesthetic innovation of products and processes, is normally delegated to the industrial property consultant who has more refined verification tools and can assess the existence of the formal requirements for protection of the idea and "deliver" the company therefore to the company a protection certificate which, always more often, is able to influence or even to determine its commercial success, before, during and after the fair exhibition ...

But how do you protect concretely the idea? First of all it is necessary to point out that the idea is not protected as such, only its realization can be protected. How? With filing a trademark registration, if the materialization of the idea is a sign to identify products or services offered to customers. With a patent, if the materialization of the idea is a technical innovation. With a design registration and pattern, if the materialization of the idea is a graphic or a new and attractive form of product. Trademarks, patents and designs are achieved through applications submitted to the competent offices, in Italy the Italian Patent and Trademark Office (www.uibm.it). What are the rules of maximum that a company should follow in this regard: 1) evaluate in which cases is really necessary to proceed to registration in order to optimize investments in industrial property; 2) determine the spatial extent of the title, for example in the case of a trademark evaluate whether to file in Italy or in other foreign countries, or to proceed directly to a European registration or to the international one; 3) enable the security services in order to verify in real time and possibly react to interfering deposits of industrial property rights with the rights acquired; 4) enable investigative services in order to monitor the market and allow companies to react quickly to any infringement of their rights; 5) use materials or production techniques or packaging that make counterfeiting more difficult; 6) in case of counterfeiting try to acquire the evidence.