Intellectual Property

1. Fight counterfeits with coordinated enforcement: Combine trademark and design enforcement with national customs recordation programs and digital authentication features. Target upstream manufacturers, not just downstream resellers.
2. Clarify AI ownership upfront: Draft development agreements that explicitly allocate rights to trained models, improvements, and derivative algorithms. Clearly define any limitations on the use of AI.to avoid disputes over AI-generated innovations.
3. Treat SDV licensing as platform-defining: Software-defined vehicle deals require robust provisions on ownership, exclusivity, field of use, and post-termination rights to prevent stranded software or immobilized vehicle functions.

Intellectual property concerns have undergone significant rebalancing from last year’s survey. The most striking shift is the collapse of AI-related ownership disputes from 69% last year to 35% this year, a signal that the industry may have resolved ambiguity through clearer contracting practices or has deprioritized theoretical concerns in favor of more immediate threats.

AI concerns have fragmented into specific categories. AI patent eligibility under evolving U.S. law (30%) has emerged as a novel response in this year’s survey, reflecting recent USPTO guidance following the 2025 Ex parte Desjardins decision. Companies are recalibrating filing strategies as the door of patent-eligibility opens wider for AI-related inventions. Inventorship disputes over AI-generated content (22%) represents another slice of last year’s broader AI ownership concern.

Counterfeit parts (29%) declined slightly from last year (33%), a potential sign that auto components remain among the most heavily counterfeited industrial products globally. Software-defined vehicle IP licensing risks (23%) represent a new explicit concern, signaling that value increasingly resides in software and connectivity rather than in hardware alone. Concerns regarding joint R&D project ownership disputes (18%) declined 4 percentage points from last year, suggesting collaborative frameworks are maturing.

IP theft commands 52% of respondents’ concerns in this year’s survey, the only intellectual property issue cited by a majority. This sustained elevation from 50% last year confirms that protecting proprietary information has become more challenging as competitive advantage shifts from mechanical designs to software algorithms, battery chemistries, and manufacturing processes that may be easier to misappropriate.

The nature of IP theft has evolved with this transformation. Software can be copied in seconds, battery formulations can be reverse-engineered, and manufacturing innovations can be photographed and replicated. Departing employees represent a primary threat vector, as engineers with expertise in EVs, batteries, and autonomous systems move between companies, sometimes taking proprietary code, designs, or datasets with them. The global nature of automotive supply chains creates additional exposure, as proprietary information passes through organizations with varying security standards across multiple jurisdictions.

Cyber intrusions targeting automotive IP have become increasingly sophisticated, with actors and competitors, sometimes state-sponsored, using advanced threats to exfiltrate technical data. Online marketplaces facilitate rapid global distribution of stolen IP, either as counterfeit parts incorporating misappropriated component designs or as digitally reproduced software and algorithms.

Companies are implementing comprehensive protection strategies that extend beyond reactive litigation. Trade secret programs now require technical controls on data access, employee training on confidentiality obligations, and exit procedures that recover company property. Contracts with suppliers need explicit controls on how proprietary technology is handled, stored, and returned.

When theft occurs, companies often combine trade secret litigation with criminal referrals, customs enforcement, and coordinated campaigns against multiple defendants. Forensic investigations of employee departures, emergency restraining orders, and cross-border enforcement have become routine responses.

The persistent majority-level concern reflects a sobering reality: in a technology-intensive, globally distributed, talent-mobile industry, the intellectual property that defines competitive advantage has never been more valuable or more difficult to protect.