Thursday, July 10, 2008
Design Patents
A Design patent may be useful in your business. This article breaks down what a Design patent is.
The type of patent we are covering in this article is the Design patent. Like the name suggests, a Design patent is used to grant the inventor rights to how an invention actually looks. The Design patent is unique because it is only given when the inventor has created something that is new, and it only protects the appearance of the invention.
Therefore, Design patents are only concerned with the aesthetics of the invention, and not how it is constructed or the materials that compose it. Usually the Design patent protects the inventor for a period of fourteen years.
The Design patent specifically protects the way in which the invention appears. To be approved for a Design patent, the Patent Office must be convinced that the Design being patented is unique only to this invention, and nothing else looking like it has ever been made before. Even though the Patent Office will not patent an invention that does not have unique Design, any Designer seeking a patent needs a Design which can be reproduced again. A reproducible Design is another criterion for a Design patent. Since the Design patent is based on the way the object looks, an application will be more favored when it is able to show that the products appearance is a result of artistic skill or specific technique.
As previously stated, in a number of cases the Design patent is assigned in situations where a utility patent will also be issued, protecting both the function and the look and feel of the invention.
The most common examples of Design patents are found within the computer industry. It is not the program functionality that is being patented, but the overall Design and interface look. Anyone can write a program that copies a file; a Design patent may protect one particular way of showing the files being deleted. As new technology is discovered, computer manufacturers look for more and more ways to protect the aesthetics of their products. A computer such as the iMac is an example of an invention that has both a Design and a utility patent.
A Design patent may be a great tool that you can use in your business but use this article to make that determination.
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