Press Release: European Commission welcomes adoption of Regulation on Community designs

The European Commission has welcomed the adoption by the EU's Council of Ministers on 12 December 2001 of a Regulation introducing a single Community system for the protection of designs. The Regulation sets up a simple and inexpensive procedure for registering designs with the European Union's Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market in Alicante. Unregistered designs will also be protected. Companies will still be able to choose to register designs under national law, as national design protection, as harmonised by the design protection Directive (98/71/EC),will continue to exist in parallel with Community design protection.