intellectual property

American  

noun

1. Law. property that results from original creative thought, as patents, copyright material, and trademarks.

2. an individual product of original creative thought.

   Microsoft’s Halo franchise is one of the most profitable intellectual properties in the video game industry.

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intellectual property British  

noun

1. an intangible asset, such as a copyright or patent

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Etymology

Origin of intellectual property

An Americanism dating back to 1840–45

Example Sentences

Its economy in the doldrums, the 27-member EU is also pushing to ease exports of spirits and wines and strengthen intellectual property rules.

From Barron's

The little guys may not have the scale, financing, expertise, or intellectual property to sustainably compete with the heavy-hitters.

From Barron's

But it says among them are four unannounced titles, including three based on new intellectual property, and a mobile game.

From BBC

Instead, the lawsuit claimed, “EDO was developing its own competing products and TV monitoring and analytics service while an iSpot customer, and was using iSpot’s intellectual property, data, and designs to do so.”

From The Wall Street Journal

Many quantum computing algorithms have businesses' intellectual property integrated directly in their circuits, which are used to process highly specific problems involving client data and other sensitive information.

From Science Daily