Designs

There are strict rules around novelty requirements and grace periods, and advice regarding the protection of a new design should be sought as early as possible, ideally during the design stage and prior to launch.

Our designs team is made up of CITMA-qualified paralegals, attorneys and litigators, ensuring that our client’s design matters are managed expertly and efficiently.

Our specialist design attorneys have significant expertise in securing registered design rights from identifying the key features of a design to navigating the quirks of territorial laws and practice. We work with you to ensure the broadest protection enabling the commercial value to be capitalised through licensing and enforcement.

Our combined skills and experience come from acting for a wide range of businesses across different industries, including a leading brand in innovative hair care and beauty technologies, a global sportswear manufacturer, and a Hollywood film production and distribution company.

We also advise on unregistered design rights and copyright, which arise automatically on the creation of a design, provided the design fulfils certain criteria.

Advantages of the UK registered design system

The UK design registration system is extremely quick and cost-efficient, allowing for bulk filings encompassing various embodiments of a design, ultimately achieving broader protection. It can be used to protect sketches, prototypes and also final forms of products. Their low cost and low threshold for validity means hundreds of designs can be registered rapidly without examination or any need for use or intention to use.

With our strategic guidance, a portfolio of UK registered design rights forms an extremely powerful asset for any creative or industrial organisation.

A selection of our design experience

Case study one

In the garden machinery industry, a client was suffering due to a parasite business based in China. The Chinese business had registered the client’s products as designs and had filed takedown notices against its goods on a retail platform based on those registrations. After compiling evidence of its hundreds of products over several decades, our specialist designs team, led by Beverley Robinson, developed a strategy to invalidate the other side’s registrations and to put in place design protection for 250+ designs to circumvent any future attacks.

Case study two

In the luxury Italian clothing sector, Robert Cumming, developed a bespoke counterfeit detection and processing system. This led to a reduction in counterfeits on auction sites, a dawn raid by Trading Standards and the Police IP Crime Unit (PIPCU) and a criminal conviction.

Case study three

In the packaging sector, Appleyard Lees assisted in a rare hearing of an examination report objection as to what constitutes a product. David Clark successfully persuaded the examiner to waive the objection.

Case study four

Representing a US footwear brand, Robert Cumming, and Chris Hoole, created and implemented a design enforcement programme. The project was such a success that the damages recovered became a six figure revenue stream for the client.

Case study five

In the personal beauty sector, Beverley Robinson, and Robert Cumming, manage a large and growing international portfolio of design rights. We advise on initial sketches, the differences in protection across jurisdictions, timing of disclosure and enforcement.