Jurisdiction(s):
United Kingdom

Originality in UK unregistered design right is 'intellectual creation': J Mac Safety Systems v Q Deck Safety Systems [2025] EWHC 2241 (Pat)—pleading, evidence and infringement under CDPA s 213

Published on: 29 September 2025

Published by a LexisNexis IP expert

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J Mac Safety Systems Ltd v Q Deck Safety Systems Ltd [2025] EWHC 2241 (Pat) What are the practical implications of this case?

Practitioners should frame pleadings and assemble proof on originality squarely around the ‘designer’s intellectual creation’ criterion. Pleadings and evidence should be tightly aligned with that yardstick. Infringement, viewed in the same way, turns on whether that intellectual creation has been taken; it is the taking of the creative contribution that renders a product infringing. Copying purely commonplace or trite elements will rarely breach a design right. That does not mean uninventive aspects are irrelevant. Originality can lie in the constellation of features. And, even where originality resides elsewhere, matching unoriginal elements sitting beside original ones can bolster an inference that copying occurred. Practitioners must also consider how to meet the intellectual creation standard where the claimant cannot reach the designer. The factual foundation for intellectual creation may have to be established inferentially from other matters the claimant can prove first-hand and directly attest. This difficulty may present itself where the designer has departed, become unreachable, or otherwise unavailable, or where entitlement to design right rests on initial marketing in the UK...

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