COMMUNITY
DESIGN
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INTRODUCTION. |
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The Community allows one to obtain the protection of a two-
or three-dimensional shap or graphic design in the 27 countries
of the European Union through one single individual application,
procedure, grant and maintenance before the Office for Harmonisation
in the Internal Market (OHIM).
2-
DESIGNATED COUNTRIES.
The current 27 Member States of the European Union are the following:
AUSTRIA
BELGIUM*
BULGARIA
CYPRUS
CZECH REPUBLIC
DENMARK
ESTONIA
FINLAND
FRANCE |
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GREECE
GERMANY
HUNGARY
ITALY
IRELAND
LATVIA
LITHUANIA
LUXEMBOURG*
MALTA
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NETHERLANDS*
POLAND
PORTUGAL
ROMANIA
SLOVAKIA
SLOVENIA
SPAIN
SWEDEN
UNITED KINGDOM |
* These three countries have a joint Trade Mark law under Benelux.
3-
ADVANTAGES OF THE COMMUNITY DESIGN.
Armongst other advantages of the Community design are:
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1. |
The community design originates from a single
application which obviously implies lower costs both for
the application and for its processing, management and
maintenance. |
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2. |
The processing of a Community design is
carried out in one language of the five official languages
of OHIM, wich are Spanish, English, French, German and
Italian. |
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3. |
In cases of Community design infrigement
it is possible to initiate a single procedure before one
single competent Community design Court whose sentence
must be carried out in all the Member States of the European
Union. |
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4- REQUIREMENTS.
In order for the Community design to be valid it must fulfil
the following requirements:
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a. |
Novelty: it must not have been disclosed
in the specialised circles of the Community. |
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b. |
Individual charácter (when the general
impression produced on an informed user is diffent from
that produced by prior designs). |
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5- GRACE
PERIOD.
NDisclosures of teh design carried ou by the cretor during
the 12 months prior to the application do not affect the novelty
of an application.
6- PROCEDURE.
The grant procedure is very simple as no examination nor opposition
by third parties are foreseen.
7- DURATION.
The duration of a Community design is 5 years counting from
the application date and is renewable for up to 25 years though
payment of a renewal fee every 5 years.
8- UNREGISTERED
COMMUNITY DESIGN.
As well as registeres Community designs unregistered protection
can be obtained without the need for making any application
for a period of 3 years counting from the date on which the
object is made public for the first time in the European Union.
The protection of the unregitered Community design is less
that of the registred Community design, not only in terms
of duration but also in terms of the scope of protection as
this only extends to copies.
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