Max Planck Series on Asian Intellectual Property Law Volume 18
Indisputably, Japan is today a major hub of product design, and designs made in Japan play an influential role in the world across a wide range of industries. This is the first and only book in English to provide a detailed overview and discussion of product design protection and practice under Japanese law. In addition to expert analysis of the application of design law by Japanese courts and the Japan Patent Office (including the far-reaching 2020 amendments), the book features seven contributions by Japanese product designers from specific industries who describe the product design process in their industry and its legal ramifications worldwide.
With in-depth description and analysis and many detailed explanatory figures and tables, the contributors cover such issues and topics as the following:
- ownership of design rights;
- requirements for design protection;
- application process for design registration;
- examination procedure;
- appeals and invalidity trials;
- design infringement and scope of protection;
- overlap of design and other intellectual property rights;
- design protection and competition law;
- international jurisdiction and governing law; and
- design rights and commercial transactions.
Industry-specific chapters cover the application of design law in furniture, home appliances, cell phones, cars, advertising, product packaging, web design, and typeface design. The book concludes with a chapter highlighting differences in design law in Japan and the European Union.
Given that Japanese design experts often note a lack of understanding of Japanese design law and practice by foreign companies, this book will appeal to law firm practitioners and in-house counsel involved in global design right portfolio management and design protection in Japan. It will also appeal to intellectual property scholars and product designers with an interest in Japanese design practice and law.
Christoph Rademacher is an associate professor of law (with tenure) at Waseda University School of Law in Tokyo. He teaches graduate and undergraduate level courses in the field of business law and intellectual property law, in both Japanese and English. Professor Rademacher s research focuses on the protection of technical innovation by means of patents and other rights. He is a regular speaker at IP law conferences in Asia, Europe and the US and has hosted over twenty international law conferences at Waseda. His publications include the treatise Patent Enforcement in the US, Germany and Japan (Oxford University Press, 2015) as a co-author, and the interdisciplinary volume The Legal System of Design Protection: Current Situation and Issues from the Perspective of Jurists and Designers (Nippon Hyoron Sha, 2016 (in Japanese)) as a co-editor with Professor Aso. He is the recipient of the 2019 Waseda University Research Award for High-Impact Publications. Professor Rademacher is admitted as an attorney-at-law in New York and as a solicitor in the Republic of Ireland. He obtained his first degree in business and law and his doctorate degree in law from the University of Siegen, Germany, and an LLM from Stanford Law School. Tsukasa Aso is an associate professor of law (with tenure) at Kyushu University School of Design in Fukuoka, where he teaches intellectual property and design law courses at the graduate and undergraduate level. His research focuses on patent law, design law and copyright law as well as the intersection of civil and intellectual property law. His recent publications include the interdisciplinary volume The Legal System of Design Protection: Current Situation and Issues from the Perspective of Jurists and Designers (Nippon Hyoron Sha, 2016 (in Japanese)) with Professor Christoph Rademacher, and The System of Design Protection in Different Countries (published as a Special Issue in 2017 (Vol. 25-2) of the Journal of the Science of Design by the Japanese Society for the Science of Design (in Japanese)). Professor Aso also writes about Japanese Intellectual Property Law in French for example, Droits de propriété industrielle et intellectuelle
