COMMERCIAL SECRET IN INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY SYSTEM: substantive context

Abstract

Background. In the conditions of the formation of the knowledge economy, the intensification of innovative development, the strengthening of globalization processes, and the active spread of information and communication technologies, the importance of commercial secrets as a tool for ensuring the competitive advantages of organizations increases. The purpose of the study is to promote a comprehensive understanding of commercial secrets to understand their place in the intellectual property portfolio of modern companies and to make effective decisions regarding their effective use and reproduction. The object of research. The article is devoted to revealing the essence of a commercial secret, clarifying its meaningful characteristics and place in the organization's intellectual property system. Methods. Achieving the goal of scientific research relies on the use of a wide arsenal of methods: abstraction, scientific description, theoretical generalization, induction, and deduction to substantiate the meaning, reveal the essence of a commercial secret, clarify its meaningful characteristics, and compare it with other categories; a dialectical combination of the general and the special to highlight the signs of a commercial secret; decomposition, structuring for the selection of types of commercial secrets, determination of directions for their systematization. Results. Approaches to comparing commercial secrets with confidential information and know-how are presented in the literature. Various interpretations of the essence of a commercial secret have been studied, in particular, in the context of its belonging to the intellectual property system. Considerable attention is paid to defining the features of a commercial secret through the lens of a dialectical combination of the general and the special. The general features of a commercial secret due to its primary informational nature are given; specific features as an object of intellectual property are highlighted. The types of commercial secrets were studied, and the vectors of their systematization and concretization in the practice of organizations were proposed. Conclusions. It is asserted that commercial secrets are classified as objects of intellectual property rights; considered the right to commercial secrecy as a type of intellectual property rights. An extended interpretation of the commercial secret is given, taking into account the totality of its features and a wide range of possible types as a methodological aspect of the formation of practical tools for the management of commercial secrets of organizations.