Design Registration

According to the Designs Act, 2000, the design registration protects the features of shape, pattern, configuration, and ornamentation, composition of lines or colors applied to the articles that need to be registered. Design registration is a type of intellectual property protection under which a newly created design applied to an article created under an industrial process can be protected from replicating. Design registration provides the creator absolute rights to use the design for ten years, which can be further extended for five years.

A shape, layout, pattern or ornament, or composition of lines and colors or combination applied to any article can be registered under the Design Act, 2000. But for a design to get registered, it must fulfill the following conditions:

Design should be new and original.
The design should relate to shape, presentation, configuration, pattern, or ornament applied to an article.
The design should be applied to any article by an industrial process.
The design should be visible and should appear in the article.
The design should not include any Trademark or Copyright.
Under the Design Act, the owner of a registered design can seek legal remedy in case of infringement.

DEFINITION OF DESIGN

A design is defined under Section 2(d) of the Designs Act 2001, as only the attributes of a shape, pattern, presentation, composition, or ornament of lines or colors that are applied to any article that is two dimensional, three dimensional, or both by an industrial process or any means whether mechanical, manual or chemical, separated or combined, which in the finished article are judged solely by the eye; but is not taken into account upon the principle of construction or anything which is in substance a merely mechanical device.

ITEMS NOT VALID TO REGISTER AS A DESIGN

There are some items that cannot be registered as a design, some are as follows:

Books, calendars, certificates, forms-and other documents, dress making patterns, jackets, greeting cards, maps and plan cards, postcards, stamps, medals.
Labels, tokens, cards, cartoons or any principle or mode of construction of an article.
Mere mechanical contrivance.
Buildings and structures.
Parts of articles that are not manufactured and sold separately.
Variations commonly used in the trade.
Basic workshop modification of components of an assembly.
Mere change in size of article.
Flags, emblems or signs of any country.
Layout designs of integrated circuits.

DOCUMENTS REQUIRED FOR DESIGN REGISTRATION

Following documents are to be submitted to get design registration:

A certified copy of the original or certified copies of reproduce from the disclaimer
Affidavits
Declaration

The affidavit should be in paragraph form and should contain a declaration of truth and verifiability. However, the cost involved in design registration may be governed by the controller according to the fourth schedule.

DESIGN REGISTRATION PROCESS

1. The application for Design registration should be filed with Form 1 along with the applicant’s details (Name, Address, and Nationality of the applicant).
If the applicant is not a natural person, i.e., a company, then the information regarding the legal status must be included.

2. The name of the article to which the design is applied

3. Registration of the design. In the case where the design is two-dimensional, two copies must be submitted. (The applicant must highlight the unique features of the design)

4. If the application mentions registering the design in more than one class, then the each class of Registration must have a separate application.

5. A disclaimer or novelty specification should be attached to each representation regarding the mechanical processes, trademark number, and letters.

6. The applicant or authorized person must witness and duly sign each representation.

7. Once the application's submission is made, the patent office will examine the application, and objections will be raised, if any.

8. Once all the objections are removed, the design shall be issued a Copyright certificate by the patent office.

The registration of design is valid for ten years from the date of Registration.

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN DESIGN REGISTRATION AND TRADEMARK

Design Registration	Trademark
A design registration would validate the protection of the physical appearance of a distinctive product you are planning to sell to the public (so long as that appearance does not affect the product's function in any way)	A trademark would protect the symbols or words you use to identify the product as coming from your specific business.
A design registration protects any new and innovative artistic design of an article of manufacture.	Trademark registration protects a word or words, name, symbol, or drawing used in commerce to discriminate one source of goods or services from that of another.

In specific conditions, both forms of protection may be convenient to cover a single design, providing potential rewards for these rights owners.

POINTS TO KEEP IN MIND DURING DESIGN REGISTRATION

File Properly
One can significantly improve the chances of successful design registration by filing a proper and professional application, addressing all the aspects of the Design Act.

Government Processing
Filings a design registration application does not assurance registration of the design. Design registration is a process, and registration is provided by the registrar founding each case's facts and premise.

Timeline
Post filing of a design registration application, it is essential to check the application's status regularly until it is processed on the Government site. The design registration application process sometimes requires a time-limit response or action from the applicant.
Therefore, it is essential to check the application's status continually and take the required steps.

Protection
A list of all registered designs is maintained and published by the Patent Office to put competitors on notice about Registration of design and preventing replication.
In case of infringement of a registered design, the owner of the registered design can seek out legal help under the Designs Act.

10 Year Protection
Designs registered under the Designs Act are valid for ten years, renewable for another five years. However, design registration mainly applies only to designs used by an industrial process on any article.
Therefore, items covered under the Trademark Act or Copyright Act cannot be registered as a design.