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ARTICLE · 07 MAY 2008

Intellectual Property News

Minter Ellison
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The Full Federal Court has dismissed an appeal by Metricon Homes Pty Ltd against a first instance finding that Metricon had infringed the copyright of Barrett Property Group Pty Ltd by reproducing a substantial part of Barrett's 'Seattle' plan without license or authorisation.

AustraliaIntellectual Property
Charles Alexander
Charles Alexander

Copyright : Australia

Metricon Loses Full Federal Court Architectural Infringement Appeal

The Full Federal Court has dismissed an appeal by Metricon Homes Pty Ltd ('Metricon') against a first instance finding that Metricon had infringed the copyright of Barrett Property Group Pty Ltd ('Barrett') by reproducing a substantial part of Barrett's 'Seattle' plan without license or authorisation, and furthermore, that this infringement had been authorised by Metricon's Managing Director and Product Development Manager. On appeal, Metricon argued that the trial judge had erred in concluding that Metricon had reproduced a 'substantial part' of the Seattle plan. This argument was rejected. Following the trial judgment in Barrett Property Group Ltd v Carlisle Homes Pty Ltd [2008] (as reported in our 21 April edition), the Full Court's finding of substantiality was derived from the significant amounts

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