What is an Industrial Design

National Institute of Intellectual Property

An industrial design refers to the artistic and design solution of a product of industrial or handicraft production that determines the appearance of the product. The industrial design is provided with legal protection, if it is new, original.

According to the Patent Law of the Republic of Kazakhstan, an industrial design is new if the totality of its essential features, reflected in the product images and listed in the list of essential features of the industrial design, is unknown from information that has become generally available in the world prior to the priority date of the industrial design. When establishing the novelty of the industrial design, applications for identical industrial designs submitted earlier in the Republic of Kazakhstan and also industrial designs patented in the Republic of Kazakhstan are taken into account.

The industrial design is recognized as original if it’s essential characteristics determine the creative nature of the product's features. Significant features include, in particular, shape, configuration, ornament and color combination.

Industrial designs are an important means of protecting the interests of the business entity, since appearance is often a determining factor when a consumer choosing a particular product. Given that the technical data of similar-purpose products manufactured by different manufacturers may coincide, the differences in their appearance can be of decisive importance. In this regard, the acquisition of a patent monopoly on an industrial design is a strategic task of the manufacturer.

An industrial design can be created in any sphere of human activity, where producing products that can have an appearance (practically, these are any objects).
Solutions protected as an industrial design can relate to the most diverse aspects of human activity - from clothes to complex design solutions (cars, boats and etc.).
Due to the fact that the industrial design refers to the appearance of an object, the concept of "design" is often used in the world to define an industrial design. Since often an industrial design is the result of a designer's creative work.
Do not recognized as industrial design the following solutions:

  1. caused solely by the technical function of the products;
  2. objects of architecture (except for small architectural forms), industrial, hydraulic engineering and other stationary structures;
  3. objects of unstable form from liquid, gaseous, loose or similar substances;
  4. products that are contrary to the public interest, the principles of humanity and morality.