Protection of Industrial Design as Intellectual Property Right in European Union

This article is aimed to present the main legal framework for obtaining intellectual property rights for industrial design in European Union. The main legal document is Regulation No. 6/2002 of the Council for a Community design administrated by European Union Intellectual property Office (EUIPO) based in Spain. This article reveals main legal characteristics of this Regulation such as: main terms and types of EU designs, requirement for registration of industrial design called Community design (CD), the scope of protection, procedure and exclusive intellectual property rights (IP rights) for CD. A community design has a unitary character and has equal effect throughout the each country of EU – EU countries. The final part is focused on the advantages of the CD system – administrative and financial, for the applicants and holders.