Community Design Protection - United Kingdom
Case history:- The Procter & Gamble sought to protect its Community Right Design (CRD) for sprayers products alleged to be infringed by Reckitt Benckiser, who had produced an air freshner spray called Air Wick Odour Stop (Air Wick Spray). RB denied infringing the Sprayer Design and counterclaimed for invalidity. On the appeal the High Court handed down the judgement and held that the CRD should be compared with features of the allegedly infringing design that were the subject of the registration. As the Sprayer Design as registered made no reference to colours and graphics, the colour and graphics of the Air Wick Spray would not be looked at in determining whether it infringed. The overall impression of the judgement is that the correct approach was to compare the various individual features of the two designs and their importance, identifying similarities and differences. It was held that since none of the dominant features was either a feature dictated solely by technical function or the product of external constraints on design freedom, the Air Wick Spray did infringe the Sprayer Design of Procter & Gamble and hence rejected the RB's arguments.
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