If you have come up with a new product, you may well, rightly, be concerned about copycat products hitting the market shortly after you launch your own product. Depending on the product in question, there are various steps you may be able to take to protect your product.
A new product, particularly a novel or innovative one, is potentially hugely profitable and, sadly, a prime target for copying.
Some protections can arise simply from the creation of a new product. However, unregistered protections offer different types of protection and, from our experience, registered rights are often more readily understood and more easily enforced.
The ideal is therefore to seek registered protection if the new product fits within the requirements. Your two key registrable protections for products are registered designs and patents. Patents are the gold standard level of protection, but are significantly more costly and harder to obtain, particularly as the criteria for something being patentable are harder to meet than the criteria for a registered design.
Registered designs grant a monopoly right to make something to that design for up to 25 years (the design must be renewed every 5 years, for up to a maximum 25 year period). Generally the design will be a 3D design, and (whilst there are always various exceptions) the broad criteria for a registered design are that it be new (i.e. different to anything in the public domain anywhere in the world) and must create a different impression from previous designs.
Patents can apply to far more than just physical products, and at their core are about protecting a novel invention. They grant a monopoly right and are mainly used to prevent others using, manufacturing, or selling a product that falls within the ‘patent claims’. Patent claims essentially describe what the invention is. Patents in the UK last for up to 20 years, but must be renewed annually from the 4th year onwards.
To be patentable something must be new, involve an inventive step, have an industrial application and not be subject to any of specific exemptions. Patents are the most complex form of registered intellectual property, and the requirements for a successful application and effective patent mean that a patent attorney should draft and advise on the specifics.
Both registered designs and patents are jurisdiction specific, and must be applied for before your product enters the public domain (with a limited 12 month grace period for registered designs if you put the product in public domain).
If you have any questions regarding protecting your products would like further information please contact Stephen Ruse on 01604 258064 or by email at [javascript protected email address].
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