Intellectual property and its link with knowledge management in the university: Universidad Centroccidental Lisandro Alvarado case study

The aim of this study was to analyse certain approaches which have arisen in the area of intellectual property and its link with knowledge management at the Universidad Centroccidental Lisandro Alvarado (UCLA). The focus of the analysis is based, mainly, on the need for regulation of intellectual property through a law guaranteeing and protecting intellectual creativity which is being produced at the UCLA, oriented to both the national and international legal system. We continued with further investigation on knowledge management, with intellectual property as the focal point, as relating to this study. Finally, some guidelines are presented for consideration in the structure and composition of the authority which is to carry out knowledge management at the UCLA, from a legal point of view. The analysis was compiled firstly with documents from different sources, followed by a multiple choice questionnaire, to reach a series of final considerations. Among these, it was evident that university management showed little initiative in planning, in the programmes, projects and specific agreements in the area of intellectual property. It was also clear that there was a legal and strategic-organisational vacuum in matters of the special legal regulation referred to; even when small steps towards its recognition were made by the UCLA authorities, creating the Commission for Intellectual Property, approving an optional subject, and with the special laws on the material at the stage of being written.