In Rolawn Ltd and Rolawn (Turf Growers) Ltd v Turfmech Machinery Ltd the High Court held that neither registered nor unregistered design rights were infringed in a dispute concerning lawn mowers.
Unregistered design rights apply in the original design or shape under the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988(CDPA). They have to be original and not commonplace and be recorded in a design document or an article made to the design spec. Then the design owner has exclusive rights to reproduce the design for commercial purposes.
With registered designs needs to be new and individual under the registered Designs Act 1949 (RDA). This is an objective test based on the overall impression. Infringement occurs when someone else makes use of the design or if a subsequent design by a third party does not produce a different effect.
In R v T above R designed a mower and registered a design. T later built and sold two similar types having seen the photographs of R’s though R’s machine was not available for purchase or inspection.
R later claimed design infringement. T denied and counterclaimed.
The High Court decided R had a registered design and this was valid as it created a different impression overall. T had not infringed this as T’s own machine did likewise building on and distinguishing itself from R’s. The court also rejected R’s claims for theory of an idea-the folding mower arm-as for unregistered design this depended on what could be seen in the drawing or in the article produced. It needed a physical manifestation-an underlying design concept was not enough. Further, on the facts the design had not been copied as not all the design’s key features could be seen from R’s photographs and the similarities claimed were similarities of a general nature which could not be protected.
