Image from dullhunk* (via Flickr) under Creative Commons (click for licence)

Dragon’s Den returned to our screens last night and this therefore seemed like the perfect time to summarise one of the talks given at Fieldfisher’s recent Patent Experts Seminar on 10th July in their fabulous new offices overlooking the Thames.

In the opening session of the seminar David Knight looked over the recent Trunki decision (PMS’s Kiddee case versus Magmatic’s Community Registered Design (CRD) for the Trunki – see image below). While reviewing a design case in the context of a patent seminar seemed a little strange at first it ultimately proved to be an interesting take on the Trunki story and made us look at the position, assumed by one of the Dragons, that the product was not patentable.

Setting the scene David noted that designs protect how “it” looks whereas patents will protect how “it” works. When the Trunki design was originally presented to the Dragons back in 2006 they all decided against investing in the product after Theo Paphitis managed to break the strap on one of the suitcases. During the course of the grilling that inventor Rob Law received he was told by Peter Jones (the tall dragon) that “This type of product is not patentable…..I could have a competing product on the market within 7 days”. But how accurate was this patentability assessment?  (more…)