What is an industrial design?
An industrial design, hereinafter referred to as a “design”, is the visible appearance of a product or part thereof, determined by the features of shape, lines, pattern, ornamentation, color combination or a combination thereof.
A product is any article obtained by an industrial or artisanal process, including parts intended to be assembled into a composite article, set or composition of articles, packaging, graphic symbols and typefaces, with the exception of computer programs.
How is an industrial design protected?
A right to a design is acquired through its registration with the competent authorities and is acquired from the date of filing an application for registration.
The right to a design is exclusive.
Some systems also provide protection for unregistered designs, but it is highly limited in terms of the rights granted and the duration of the protection.
Territorial nature of protection!
Industrial design protection is valid only for the territory where the registration was made. Design protection in Bulgaria is limited only to the territory of the country.
The design protection of the European Union has a regional nature. This is protection that gives rights on the territory of the union.
What is the term of protection?
According to the legal regulation in Bulgaria:
The term of protection for a design is 10 years from the date of filing the application.
The registration can be renewed for three consecutive periods of 5 years each.
That is, the term of protection is 25 years in total.
The term of protection for a European Union design is also 25 years, but the first renewal is on the 5th, not the 10th, year.
What rights does the registration of an industrial design grant?
The scope of legal protection is determined by the image, respectively by the images of the registered design and extends to any design that does not create a different overall perception in the informed user.
The right to a registered design includes the right of its owner to use the design, to dispose of it, as well as to prohibit third parties without his consent from copying or using in commercial activity a design included in the scope of protection.
The use of the design includes the production, offering and displaying on the market or the use of a product in which a design from the scope of protection is incorporated or to which it is applied, as well as the import, export or storage of the same product for these purposes.
The right is effective in relation to third parties in good faith from the date of publication of the design registration.
What are the requirements for a design to be registered?
A design is registered if it is new and original.
A design is new if, before the filing date of the application, respectively before the priority date, no other identical design is known that has become publicly available through publication, use, registration or disclosure in any other way anywhere in the world. Designs are considered identical if their features differ only in immaterial aspects.
A design is considered original if the overall impression it creates on the informed user differs from the overall impression created by a design that has become publicly available before the filing date of the application for registration or when priority is claimed before the priority date. When assessing originality, the degree of freedom of the designer in creating the design is taken into account.
The following shall not be registered:
- a design that is contrary to public policy or morality;
- a design whose features are determined solely by the technical function of the product;
- a design whose features are determined by the need for the product to which the design is incorporated or to which it is applied to be mechanically connected or placed in, around or against another product so that both products perform their functions, with the exception of a design whose purpose is to enable multiple assembly or connection of interchangeable products in a modular system.