ABOU NAJA Talks Entrepreneurship and Fitness with Maya Nassar

Entrepreneurship and creativity are two sides of the same coin that can never be separated. For entrepreneurs to be successful they require creativity. This is because creativity enables entrepreneurs to offer a value proposition that differentiates their products from competitors. For this reason, entrepreneurs must be able to protect and monetize their ideas. To learn more about the importance of intellectual property protection in entrepreneurship we had a conversation with fitness expert and entrepreneur Maya Nassar.

Maya Nassar is a Lebanon-based fitness expert, entrepreneur, and model with a global reach. Beyond that, Maya wears many caps including being a TV host, brand ambassador, wife, and mother. With a full and busy schedule Maya understand the value of her time and is especially intentional about everything she does. As such, the fitness guru not only puts a lot of effort into building her fitness empire. Also, Maya has expended a lot of effort towards intellectual property protection, trademarking, and copyrighting.

As many budding business owners will attest, the lines between business and personal branding can blur, as in Maya's case.

Specifically, Maya stumbled on her passion for fitness by "accident". In fact, she embarked on her fitness journey after battling against weight problems of her own. After managing to shed the excess weight and launch a healthier lifestyle, Maya wanted to help others to revamp their lives. Thus, her fitness empire was born, with 2 gyms in Lebanon and another gym is launching soon.

In addition, Maya recently launched a fitness website and program for pregnant women in collaboration with a doctor. The program is notably the first of its kind in the Middle East and took Maya over a year to build. As part of this venture and all of Maya's other ventures, credibility was a key focal point. As such, launching this website did not only require time but other expenses.

Experience with Intellectual Property

It is, for this reason, IP protection in entrepreneurship is so important. Even good ideas require time, money, and effort to bring to life. As such, entrepreneurs need the assurance that their effort will not only be realized but also that they will not be stolen or easily replicated. According to Maya, “There can be very unethical people, and if we do not take care of our brands, they can use our content for their benefit.”