From Coca-Cola to Banksy: How much is a secret worth in IP?

Ownership is central to the concept of IP, but what happens when the patent or trade secret is unknown, or who owns that IP? Ana Neves of Inventa explores.

While working in intellectual property it is natural to develop a tendency to attribute ownership to things: “That mobile phone was developed by that company”, or “the inventorship of that medicine is attributed to that team of researchers”.

In other words, in IP we are trained to match a What to a Who that inevitably is the winner of the game (or at least, the owner of the IP right).

But what happens when one of the pieces is missing and there is no What or no Who? Can you still win the game?

Here are two examples of successful IP secrets and what happens when the secret is out.

The Coca-Cola patent

I often hear about the Coca-Cola patent as an example of a very successful link between patent strategy and market penetration. Unfortunately, the Coca-Cola patent is closer to a unicorn than to the market. Everybody likes the idea of a patent for the Coca-Cola beverage (and of a unicorn, for that matter) but, much like a unicorn, no one has ever seen one as they simply don’t exist.

The Coca-Cola Company has one of the most brilliant IP strategies in the world, based on registration of trademarks and of design in support of a powerful marketing team that continuously updates the company’s image and engages with new generations, keeping the image of the products fresh while renewing the company’s IP portfolio with more trademarks and designs.

What Coca-Cola doesn’t have (and never had) is a patent for its most iconic beverage. This attests to the brilliance of the company’s IP strategy. A patent is valid for 20 years. Coca-Cola has been around since 1886 and if it had been patent-protected it would have been off-patent more than 100 years ago.

Most importantly, its formula would have been disclosed to the public and any other company could have started to copy it. By keeping its formula secret, Coca-Cola ensured continued protection of the core of its business, investing in marketing, packaging and branding instead.

Earlier in 2026, it was revealed that the Coca-Cola formula had been discovered using standard lab equipment. Apparently, a ‘motivated chemist’ was able to identify and quantify the ingredients, allegedly “cracking” the Coca-Cola secret.

This is the risk that a company takes when relying on trade secrets. As technology evolves, the improbability of discovering what was kept hidden becomes a possibility and someone, be it a competitor company or a curious individual, can discover the secret by applying reverse engineering and using fancy lab equipment.

There is no confirmation that the ‘discovered formula’ is indeed the Coca-Cola formula, but assuming it is, now is the time to assess if the IP strategy is strong enough to protect the company from its competitors in the market.

Coca-Cola invested in a strong branding and registering trademarks and design. Will the revelation of the formula diminish its value in the market? As a consumer, will you buy a generic brand instead of the actual Coca-Cola? In the end, has the Who given reasons enough for consumers consistently choosing Coca-Cola, despite the fact there is no protection for the What?

Banksy, the unknown artist

For street art lovers and fans of justice Banksy is the ultimate contemporary hero. He paints, he raises awareness of social injustices, and he mocks the rich and the establishment with his works of art and on social media. He is ‘one of us’ and his anonymity enables him to point to some hard truths.

The fact that his identity has never been confirmed has had no impact on the value of his art. There is an increasing mystique surrounding this artist since started working in the 1990s. Nowadays, he is considered one of the major artists of the 21st century, with paintings being sold for millions of euros.

Although he attracted street art fans early in his career, he became world-famous in 2018 when one of his paintings self-destructed at an auction house the moment it was sold for £1 million. In spite of being criticised for urban vandalism, his rebellious nature and property destruction, his intellectual property has only increased in value since.

That is, until recently, when Reuters published an article suggesting the identity of Banksy, providing evidence and a timeline. The internet went nuts.

The fact that the artist’s work could decrease in value should his identity be revealed is, from an IP perspective, counterintuitive: the works of art (What) were always known, but its value could decrease upon the revelation of the artist (Who).

The value of the works seems to have benefited from the reputation of the artist, tied to a sort of ‘urban warrior’ myth, which could be irreparably destroyed.

The value of a secret

The value of an IP secret cannot be measured merely by the secret itself and should consider the IP strategy of the company, its marketing plans and the reputation of the company.

Trade secrets are usually applied to Whats—recipes, formulas, gadgets, and anything that can be copied and provide a competitive advantage to its owner. However, Whos may also carry some value and may increase or decrease the value of the product the secret is linked to.

Ana Neves is patent consultant at Inventa, and can be contacted at aneves@inventa.com