WORLD
INTELLECTUAL
PROPERTY
ORGANIZATION
www.wipo.int
Courtesy: Roces S.R.L.
How extensive
is industrial design
protection?
Generally, industrial design protection is limited
to the country in which protection is granted.
Under the Hague Agreement Concerning the
International Deposit of Industrial Designs, a
WIPO-administered treaty, a procedure for an international registration is offered. An applicant can file
a single international deposit either with WIPO or the
national office of a country which is party to the
treaty. The design will then be protected in as many
member countries of the treaty as the applicant wishes.
For more information contact the
World Intellectual Property Organization at:
Address:
Telephone:
34, chemin des Colombettes
P.O. Box 18
CH-1211 Geneva 20
Switzerland
41 22 338 91 11
What is an
industrial
design?
www.wipo.int
Fax:
41 22 733 54 28
e-mail:
[email protected]
or its New York Coordination Office at:
Address:
Telephone:
2, United Nations Plaza
Suite 2525
New York, N.Y. 10017
United States of America
1 212 963 6813
Fax:
www.wipo.int
www.wipo.int
1 212 963 4801
e-mail:
[email protected]
Visit the WIPO website at:
http://www.wipo.int
www.wipo.int
and the WIPO Electronic Bookshop at
wipo.int/ebookshop
WIPO Publication No. L450ID/E
ISBN 92-805-0815-6
What is an industrial design?
An industrial design is the ornamental or aesthetic
aspect of an article. The design may consist of
three-dimensional features, such as the shape or
surface of an article, or of two-dimensional features, such as patterns, lines or color.
Industrial designs are applied to a wide variety of
products of industry and handicraft: from technical
and medical instruments to watches, jewelry, and
other luxury items; from housewares and electrical
appliances to vehicles and architectural structures;
from textile designs to leisure goods.
To be protected under most national laws, an
industrial design must be non-functional. This
means that an industrial design is primarily of an
aesthetic nature and any technical features of the
article to which it is applied
are not protected.
Why protect
industrial
designs?
Industrial designs are
what make an article
attractive and appealing; hence, they add to
the commercial value of
a product and increase
its marketability.
When an industrial design is
protected, the
owner the
person or entity
that has registered the design
is assured an
exclusive right
Courtesy: Lindt & Sprngli A.G.
against unauthorized copying or imitation of the design by
third parties. This helps to ensure a fair return on
investment. An effective system of protection also
benefits consumers and the public at large, by
promoting fair competition and honest trade practices, encouraging creativity, and promoting more
aesthetically attractive products.
Protecting industrial designs helps economic development, by encouraging creativity in the industrial and manufacturing sectors, as well as in traditional arts and crafts. They contribute to the
expansion of commercial activities and the export
of national products.
Industrial designs can be relatively simple
and inexpensive to develop and protect.
They are reasonably accessible to small
and medium-sized enterprises as well
as to individual artists and craftsmen,
in both industrialized and
developing countries.
How can industrial designs
be protected?
In most countries, an industrial design must be
registered in order to be protected under industrial
design law. As a general rule, to be registrable, the
design must be new or original. Different
countries have varying definitions of such terms, as
well as variations in the registration process itself.
Generally, new means that no identical or very
similar design is known to have existed before.
Once a design is registered, a registration certificate
is issued. Following that, the term of protection is
generally five years, with the possibility of further
periods of renewal up to, in most cases, 15 years.
Depending on the particular national law and the
kind of design, an industrial design may also be
protected as a work of art under copyright law.
In some countries, industrial design
and copyright protection can exist
concurrently. In other countries, they
are mutually exclusive: once
the owner chooses one kind of
protection, he can no longer
invoke the other.
Under certain circumstances an industrial design may also be protectable
under unfair competition law,
although the conditions of protection
and the rights and
remedies ensured
can be significantly
different.
Courtesy: Tonello SAS
di Gianni e Mario Tonello & C.
www.wipo.int
Courtesy: Victorinox
