Functional Designs And Trademarks – Limits To The Scope Of Protection

To avoid protection of technical solutions by trademark and design rights, the relevant legal acts stipulate exemptions from protection/protectability for certain shapes/features. The most important provisions are presented here.

Introduction

Technical features of a product may be protected by a patent or utility model – if they are new and innovative. But the period of protection is very limited. As a product may also be protected as a design or trademark, which enjoys a longer period of protection (for trademarks, basically unlimited), owners often register designs or trademarks, hoping that they also prolong their monopoly in the technical features formerly protected by a patent or utility model or obtain monopolies over technical solutions with out meeting the relatively stringent conditions laid down in patent law. How ever, as this would counteract the underlying idea of patent protection (limited period of exclusivity in exchange for the public disclosure of