This piece is the third installment of a four-part series called “Why Should Librarians Care about Intellectual Property (IP)?” See links to the previous Parts 1&2 below, at the base of this post.

Welcome to the third blog post in a series created to teach librarians the basics about searching for intellectual property information, including patents, trademarks, designs, and copyright. In previous posts, we’ve looked at patents (which grant an exclusive right to an invention) and trademarks (which protect the branding for a product or service). Today’s post will explore the strange world of industrials designs, which protect the shape or visual ornamentation of an object. Designs can often be confused with trademarks, since US trademarks with visual elements are classified with a design search code. Designs and trademarks are actually completely different forms of IP, and in the US, industrial designs are actually classified as a type of patent.

What are designs?

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) explains that “a design consists of the visual ornamental characteristics embodied in, or applied to, an article of manufacture.” In the United States, designs are granted as design patents, which last for 14 years from the date of grant and protect only the appearance of an invention, not structural or utilitarian features. Outside of the United States, design are more often a completely separate form of IP from patents or trademarks and are usually referred to as “industrial designs.” The World Intellectual Property Office (WIPO) describes how industrials designs protect “the ornamental or aesthetic aspect of an article” and can “consist of three dimensional features, such as the shape of an article, or two dimensional features, such as patterns, lines or color.”

Industrial designs are often classified using the Locarno Classification, and even US design patents are assigned Locarno Classification designations.

Why should librarians care about designs?

While industrials designs are probably the rarest form of IP that librarians will be asked to search, it can still be important for librarians who often work with IP (such as corporate or law librarians) to know where and how to search for design patents or industrial designs. Having a base knowledge about the different types of IP will help librarians avoid the mistake of searching for industrial designs as trademarks (or as patents, when looking for non-US designs).

How can I find designs?

Here are a few free online resources where librarians can start their search for design patents and industrial designs:
• USPTO website: In the advanced search form for the USPTO Patent Full-Text database, search by application type (4=design patents) using a query like APT/4 AND TTL/Bottle to limit your search to only design patents.
• WIPO website: Use the Global Brand Database to search industrials design data from eight countries and designs registered with WIPO through the Hague Agreement. The Hague Express Database can also be used to search WIPO Hague registrations.
• DesignView: This free database created by The European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) allows users to search across industrial design data from 57 IP offices around the world.

Intellectual property searching can be a daunting task, especially with less well-known forms of IP like industrial designs, but help is available from research professionals at Cadence Group. Cadence Group provides staffing and research support solutions in all types of libraries, as well as expertise in various industries, including aerospace, financial, food & beverage, telecom, legal, bio-medical, retail and transportation.

This piece is the third installment of a four-part series “Why Should Librarians Care about Intellectual Property (IP)?” See part 1 of this series: Focus on Patents
See part 2 of this series: Focus on Trademarks

For more information, check out Cadence Group’s Library Management & Research Practice Page.

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