Proline Pipe, an Alberta company, created certain design
drawings for pipe bending machines. A former employee took those
drawings with him when he left the company. A rival company
obtained copies of the drawings and manufactured the pipe bending
machines using the Proline drawings. A third company, Provincial
Rentals, acquired the assembled machines and rented out the
machines to its customers.
Then Proline Pipe sued Provincial Rentals for copyright
infringement. Can copyright extend to the assembled machines that
were manufactured using the copied drawings, and then acquired and
commercialized by Provincial Rentals?
In a recent Alberta decision, Proline Pipe Equipment Inc v Provincial
Rentals Ltd., 2019 ABQB 983 (CanLII), the court
reviewed the claim that copyright should extend, not only to the
drawings, but also to the final assembled product.
