Stolen Design

[GenaA]

What is the name of your state? Nova Scotia/Maine

I have a product that was invented in 1990. It was not design patented until 2003. A company in France has stolen the design and has been selling it in Europe since 2000. THere were some market tests done prior to the patent being completed and the theif is saying that because we had put the item on the market before the patent was in place that they are not violating our protection. I can prove that this item was invented in 1990 and that there is no way someone else could have come up with the identical design. Basically they took our product and made an exact injection mould of it. Is there anything I can do?

 

[divgradcurl]

What is the name of your state? Nova Scotia/Maine

I have a product that was invented in 1990. It was not design patented until 2003. A company in France has stolen the design and has been selling it in Europe since 2000. THere were some market tests done prior to the patent being completed and the theif is saying that because we had put the item on the market before the patent was in place that they are not violating our protection. I can prove that this item was invented in 1990 and that there is no way someone else could have come up with the identical design. Basically they took our product and made an exact injection mould of it. Is there anything I can do?

Unless you have a patent in France, or wherever they are selling the product, then no. If they try and sell in the U.S. where you have a design patent, then you can sue them. But a U.S. patent is only enforceable in the U.S.

Just FYI, in Europe they have an "absolute novelty" requirement to obtain a patent -- in other words, if you had made any public disclosures of your product prior to filing for the patent, you wouldn't be able to get a patent -- that's probably where their statement came from.