Design protection in Ireland: tell us more!

Often referred to as the Emerald Isle,
Ireland is actually made up of four
colours, as the picture above proves ...

Class 99 doesn't get too much news and information about design protection in Ireland. That's why we are pleased to tell you that there's a snippet of available Ireland-specific information for you. It's "Intellectual Property Protection for Designers", which you can read here on the Arthur Cox website (Arthur Cox sounds like a sole practitioner, but is actually a large law firm with an all-Ireland practice. Herbert Smith used to have the same problems with his name till he changed it to Herbert Smith Freehills).

The similarity of Irish law to that of the UK law, based partly on close commercial and legal links and partly on the fact that each jurisdiction has had to implement the same package of European design rights, might lead one to guess that this account is just a description of UK law with the 'UK' crossed out and 'Ireland' inserted.  But there's more to it than that. As the Arthur Cox article, penned by the excellent and venerable Robert Clark, concludes:

"These comments on Irish Law are generally accurate of UK law also although UK Law has a separate 15 year unregistered design right. Generally speaking, the complaint should be made in the country where infringement occurs".

This in turn suggests that there should be a follow-up on what it's like to pursue a design infringement claim through the Irish courts. Is the length of time taken in litigating IP matters a tiresome myth or a painful reality? How IP-savvy are the Republic's judiciary at trial and appellate level? What's Ireland like for interim and final relief?  And how much can contested design infringement be expected to cost?  Given the ever-improving opportunities for forum shopping, it would be great to know.