Software development outsourcing is a profitable proposition for a business, it is the one that is attracting huge attention across industrial sectors. It describes a situation in which an organization chooses to hire a third-party programmer to work for it related to software development.
PHP and .Net are the most popular and commonly outsourced web technologies. Software development outsourcing requires a large amount of information sharing between the client and the vendor.
Intellectual property is an indispensable factor of every organization. It is a product that your company creates through its intelligence that is protected by law from unauthorized use. Intellectual Property covers industrial design, trademarks, copyright, patents, etc.
Intellectual property outsourcing allows its organization to focus on its core business. The firm that outsources some of its functions into other countries is receiving rewards and meeting the bottom line goals.
Software development is also known as software design or application development. It is a process by which individual software is created using a specific programming language.
The protection of IP is a major issue in software development outsourcing. Patents, Trademarks, Trade secrets, Copyrights are the four main types of intellectual property securities for your business.
There are many cases of unethical vendors misusing IP by either selling the source code developed for a client to competitors or by making small changes to the source code and putting it as their own product in the market. Such incidents often threaten the competitive advantage gained through outsourcing.
Organizations believe that software development outsourcing should bear the following points in mind to protect their intellectual property:
- Share only the mandatory information: Rather than giving all the employees full data access, it is better to show discretion. This allows the company to have complete control over the data.
- Confirm the information security policy with the vendor: Before you select a vendor, it is essential to inquire about their information security management policy. An information security management system(ISMS) is a set of rules and regulations followed by the vendor in its premises to protect the intellectual property of the clients. Its aim is to minimize the risk and ensure business continuity by pro-actively limiting the impact of a security breach.
Usually, two rules form a part of all information management policy :
- There will be a dedicated data server with audit controls to carry out all development activities
- All the members of the development team working on a client project will sign a confidentiality agreement.
Spell out licensing and ownership of source code before the project begins: It is essential to get the vendor to sign an agreement to transfer the ownership and licensing by using the source code in part or as a whole. This should be done before the project begins.
Study the legal environment of the vendor’s country in terms of IP protection: It is necessary to study the legal system in the vendor’s country to understand the laws related to IP enforcement and jurisdiction over contract disputes.
Narola Infotech is fully committed to safeguarding intellectual property rights and business information of all its clients. In this regard, we have adopted stringent ethical rules and privacy policies across our office premises and is applicable to all our employees.
As a part of our ‘Hire a Developer’ program, We have undertaken following high-tech measures towards intellectual property protection of our clients:
- The latest encryption and access sharing technologies are utilized.
- The signing of all traces of code information post project completion.
- Deletion of all traces of code information post project completion.
- Storing all confidential information in a secure environment.
- Clear authorship waiver agreement to ensure that the client is the only owner of the code.