Intangible assets refer to identifiable non-monetary assets that have no physical form and are owned or controlled by enterprises. Intangible assets can be divided into broad sense and narrow sense. Intangible assets in a broad sense include monetary funds, financial assets, long-term equity investment, patent rights, trademark rights and so on. Because they have no physical entity, they show some legal rights or technologies. But intangible assets are usually understood in a narrow sense in accounting, that is, patent rights and trademark rights are called intangible assets.
Intangible assets include the following:
1. Patents According to the provisions of China's patent law, patents can be divided into invention patents, utility model patents and design patents. From the date of application, the term of invention patent is 20 years, and the term of utility model and design patent is 10 year;
2. Non-patented technology Non-patented technology has no legal validity, only economic validity;
3. Trademark rights A trademark is a symbol used to identify specific goods and services, which represents a kind of reputation of an enterprise and thus has corresponding economic value. According to the provisions of China's Trademark Law, the validity period of a registered trademark is 10 years, which can be extended according to law.
4. Copyright, also known as copyright, refers to some special rights that the author enjoys according to law for the literary, scientific and artistic works he creates;
5. Land use right is the right of enterprises to develop, utilize and operate state-owned land within a certain period of time according to law;
6. Franchising, also called franchising, refers to the right of an enterprise to operate or sell a certain commodity in a certain area or the right of an enterprise to accept another enterprise to use its trademark, trade name and secret technology.
To sum up, intangible assets include patents, non-patented technologies, trademarks, copyrights, land use rights, franchises and so on. Intangible assets refer to identifiable non-monetary assets that have no physical form and are owned or controlled by enterprises. Intangible assets in a broad sense include monetary funds, accounts receivable, financial assets, long-term equity investment, patent rights, trademark rights and so on.
Legal basis:
Article 20 of the Accounting Standards for Business Enterprises
Assets refer to resources formed by past transactions or events of an enterprise, which are owned or controlled by the enterprise and are expected to bring economic benefits to the enterprise.
The past transactions or events of the enterprise mentioned in the preceding paragraph include purchase, production, construction or other transactions or events. It is expected that future transactions or events will not form assets.
The ownership or control of an enterprise means that the enterprise enjoys the ownership of a certain resource, or although it does not enjoy the ownership of a certain resource, it can be controlled by the enterprise.
The expected economic benefits to the enterprise refer to the potential that directly or indirectly leads to the inflow of cash and cash equivalents into the enterprise.