UK: First disclosure of designs – choose carefully
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I am a partner in our Intellectual Property practice based in London, specialising in IP enforcement and litigation across a range of rights including patents, trade marks, designs and confidential information. I frequently act in complex litigation (often with a cross border element) before the IPEC, High Court, Court of Appeal and CJEU, as well as in proceedings before the EUIPO/UKIPO. I also advise on international customs enforcement programmes and detentions.
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Ewan Grist considers the important questions that courts in both the EU and UK need to answer for their unregistered design regimes.
One of the enduring peculiarities of the unregistered Community design regime, introduced almost 20 years ago by the Community Design Regulation 6/2002, is that one fundamental question remains unanswered: where a design is first disclosed outside of the EU, is that design still capable of attracting unregistered Community design (UCD) protection, or does that first non-EU disclosure destroy the novelty of any subsequent EU disclosure, such that UCD cannot arise in the first place?
This matters because EU and non-EU businesses frequently need to first exhibit their new products at trade fairs or other events outside of the EU. Given the importance of UCD protection, it is of considerable surprise that this question still remains unanswered by the CJEU.
Read the full article, first published by Managing IP online in May 2021, here.
