During the seven intensive sessions of the Intellectual Property elective, the MBA and Executive MBA students were trained to acquire the desired and necessary legal and strategic skills to bring value to organisations that aspire to utilise intellectual property as a business tool. The elective was taught by Dr Helen Gubby, an assistant professor of business law at RSM, as well as by Rui Santos and David Harry, both experienced intellectual property and new product development specialists connected to International Innovation Company.
Competitive strategies
“Globally, more and more organisations see that in today’s knowledge economy intellectual property is rapidly becoming the main game,” said Executive MBA course participant Dennis van Booma. “Intellectual property is a valuable asset and can generate significant amounts of additional income,” he said, adding that it can also be used as ‘a weapon’ in competition and businesses need to be prepared for the intellectual property strategies used by their competitors. “In the current business environment, not only lawyers, but also business leaders need intellectual property know-how to push the protected assets forward and create value for the shareholders,” said Van Booma.
Identify, capitalise and implement
RSM has a strong link with the business world and designed this elective to bring forward leaders and specialists who are able to identify and capitalise on intellectual property and implement the right processes to get business going. To bring theory into practice, the Executive MBA students went on a field trip to hear the experiences of entrepreneurs who went through this process.
The International Full-time MBA Class of 2016 and the Executive MBA Class of 2015 will graduate at the Beurs-World Trade Center in Rotterdam on Friday 18 March 2016.