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TITLE III. INDUSTRIAL DESIGNS
Chapter I. Designs accepted for registration
Section 1. Registration of industrial designs
Article 184: To be accepted for registration, an industrial design must be new.
An industrial design shall be considered to be new if it has not been disclosed in
any part of the world, by publication in a tangible form or by use or in any other
form prior to the date of filing or, as the case may be, the date of priority of the
application for registration.
Industrial designs and references which are contrary to public order or morality
may not be accepted for registration.
Section 2. Rights to industrial designs and references to the creator
Article 185: An industrial design shall be owned by the person who has created it or to his
successors in title, but the first applicant shall be considered to be the creator
thereof, unless there is evidence to the contrary.
If several persons have jointly created a design, the right to the industrial designs
shall belong to them.
Article 186: If the industrial design has been created by an employee in the performance of
an employment contract, the right in the industrial designs shall belong to the
employer, unless the contract stipulates otherwise.
In the event that the financial gains derived by the employer are disproportionate
in relation to the employee’s salary and in relation to the gains which the
employer could reasonably expect from his employee’s inventive input when he
hired him, the employee shall be entitled to fair compensation.
Article 187: If the invention has been made by an employee outside the performance of an
employment contract with the help of material, information or know-how
belonging to the employer, the right to the industrial designs shall belong to the
employer, unless the contract stipulates otherwise.
The employee who has made the invention shall be entitled to compensation
equivalent to at least one-third of the net direct and indirect gains which the
employer has obtained from exploiting the invention.
The obligation to pay compensation shall arise from the making of a patentable
invention, not the patent.
Any promise or undertaking which the inventor may give his employer to the
effect that he waives the compensation to which he is entitled under the previous
sub-paragraph, shall have no legal effect.