Intellectual Property

Industrial Design Registration in Pakistan: Protecting the Look of a Product Under the Registered Designs Ordinance, 2000

A design registration protects how a product looks: the curve of a bottle, the profile of a fan blade, the pattern on a lawn print. It does not protect how the product works. In Pakistan that protection comes almost entirely from registration, and a design that has been on the market for more than a year before filing is usually lost for good. Manufacturers searching for the best industrial design lawyer in Karachi tend to arrive with a product already on the shelf and a copy already in the bazaar, and the first question is whether the twelve-month grace period in section 3(3) still saves them. This guide explains what can be registered, how IPO-Pakistan deals with an application, and what a registration actually lets the owner do.

What counts as a registrable design

Section 2 of the Registered Designs Ordinance, 2000 defines a design as the features of shape, configuration, pattern or ornament applied to an article by an industrial process, being features that in the finished article are “judged solely by the eye”. An “article” is any article of manufacture, and includes a part made and sold separately, such as a replacement cap or a handle.

Three practical consequences follow from the definition:

• Appearance only. The definition expressly excludes any method or principle of construction and features dictated solely by technical and functional considerations. A gear tooth profile that must take a particular shape to mesh is not a design; a decorative casing around the gearbox may be.
• Industrial application. The design must be applied to an article by an industrial process. One-off artworks are left to copyright.
• Article-specific protection. Registration is for the article or set of articles named in the application (section 3(1)). The same design used on a different product needs its own registration, which section 6 allows the proprietor to obtain without the earlier registration counting against it.

Rule 11 of the Registered Designs Rules, 2023 tells the Registrar to refuse designs for paintings, sculptures, drawings, engravings and photographs, architectural works and works of artistic craftsmanship, designs contrary to public order or morality, and trade marks or trade dress. Words, letters or numerals that are not essential to the design are to be removed; if they are essential, the Registrar may require a disclaimer.

Novelty, originality and the twelve-month grace period

Section 3(2) requires a design to be “new or original”. It is not registrable if it is the same as a design already registered in Pakistan or published anywhere in the world before the filing (or priority) date, or if it differs from such a design only in immaterial details or in features that are variants commonly used in the trade. The test is worldwide: a design shown on a Chinese supplier’s website or in a European catalogue can defeat a Pakistani application.

The Sindh High Court applied this in ORO Industries v. Muhammad Hanif (Suit No. 2223 of 2015, heard with J.M. No. 09 of 2016), where a registered design for a triangular pencil was cancelled because similar triangular pencils had been sold for decades. The court noted that the 2000 Ordinance widened novelty from a Pakistan-only test under the old law to a worldwide one. The plaintiff still obtained an interim injunction, but on trade mark and trade dress grounds, not on the design. The lesson is that a weak design registration is a liability in litigation, and that a business should not rely on it alone.

Section 3(3) offers some relief for early disclosure. A disclosure within twelve months before the filing or priority date is disregarded if it resulted from acts of the applicant or a predecessor, or from an abuse committed against them. Rule 9 of the 2023 Rules requires the applicant to claim this expressly, identifying the circumstances and the date and place of the first disclosure. If the claim is not made at filing, the disclosure is likely to be treated as prior art.

Who may apply and who owns the design

Under section 3(1), the application is made by the person claiming to be the proprietor. The definition of proprietor in section 2 sets out three ownership rules that matter in commercial practice:

• The creator of the design is ordinarily the proprietor.
• Where a design is executed for another person for good consideration, that other person is the proprietor. A brand that pays a freelance designer or a mould-maker therefore owns the design, but the commission terms should still say so in writing.
• Where two or more people create the same design independently, the right to registration belongs to the one with the earliest filing date, or the earliest priority date if priority is claimed.

The last rule makes design protection a race to file. Rules 28 to 32 require an address for service in Pakistan, and an agent is authorised on Form D-13. A foreign applicant without a Pakistani address will find that examination does not proceed until one is supplied.

Filing and examination at IPO-Pakistan

Applications are filed at the Patent Office, which is part of IPO-Pakistan (section 5(1)). The Registered Designs Rules, 2023 (S.R.O. 341(I)/2023, notified on 6 March 2023) replaced the Patents and Designs Rules, 1933 and set the current procedure:

Stage	What happens	Rule
Application	Form D-1 with representations, a statement of the class and the articles, and any priority document. One application per class.	8, 10
Representations	Drawings, photographs, 3D models or other visual forms, with a statement of novelty. The Registrar may ask for a specimen or further views.	10
Examination	The examiner reports to the Registrar within two months of receipt.	13
Objections	Reply or request a hearing within two months. Extensions are available on Form D-4 up to six months from the first examination report. Hearings are fixed on at least ten days’ notice.	13
Acceptance and certificate	Form D-5 and the fee within 30 days of acceptance, after which the certificate issues.	13, 14
Publication	Weekly publication in the Patents Journal and the Gazette, with dates, class and the representation.	15

Articles are classified under the 32-class list in the Third Schedule to the Rules. Choosing the wrong class or describing the article too narrowly is the most common avoidable mistake. Section 5(2) allows the Registrar to make whatever inquiries he thinks fit on novelty, and section 5(3) allows him to refuse the application or register it with modifications. Appeals lie to the High Court (section 5(6)) within ninety days of receiving the decision (rule 20). An application left incomplete through the applicant’s default is deemed abandoned (section 5(4)). Official fees are set by the First Schedule to the Rules and are not reproduced here.

Term, extension, restoration and the register

Under section 5(5) a design is registered as of the date of application, unless the Registrar directs otherwise. Section 7(1) protects it for ten years from the date of registration. Section 7(3) allows the term to be extended for a second and a third ten-year period if the prescribed application and fee are filed before the current period expires. The maximum life of a registered design in Pakistan is therefore thirty years.

A late extension can still be made within six months after expiry on payment of an additional fee (section 7(3)). If that is also missed, rule 17 of the 2023 Rules allows restoration of a lapsed design on Form D-4 within six months of the design ceasing to have effect, with the unpaid and late fees and a verified statement explaining the failure. Restoration is a matter for the Registrar, so a renewal diary remains the real safeguard.

The register is prima facie evidence of its contents (section 13(3)). Assignments and licences should be recorded under section 15 and rule 22, because an unrecorded owner will struggle to prove title in an urgent injunction application. Under section 18, the representation becomes open to public inspection once the certificate issues, but for prescribed classes inspection is restricted for a period. Rule 25 also lets the Registrar withhold designs considered prejudicial to national security.

Rights, infringement and remedies

Section 7(2) gives the registered proprietor the right to stop others, without consent, from making, selling or working articles that copy the registered design when they do so for commercial purposes. Section 2 frames the same right as preventing third parties from applying the design to an article, and from making, importing, selling, hiring or offering such articles.

Points to note before suing:

• No action before the certificate. Section 5(5) bars proceedings for anything done before the certificate of registration is issued.
• Interim injunctions. The proviso to section 8(1) requires the proprietor seeking a temporary injunction to show a prima facie case, that the design is valid, and that it has been infringed. Validity is therefore in issue from the first hearing, as the ORO Industries case shows.
• Innocent infringers. Damages are not awarded against a defendant who was not aware, and had no reasonable ground for supposing, that the design was registered (section 9). Marking a product “registered” without the design number is not enough to fix knowledge, but an injunction is still available.
• Threats. Section 22 allows a person threatened with groundless infringement proceedings to sue for a declaration, an injunction and damages. A mere notification that a design is registered is not a threat. Our guide to cease and desist letters explains how to frame one.
• Costs. A court that upholds a contested registration may certify that validity was contested, which carries a costs advantage in later proceedings (section 21).

Section 8 itself does not name a court. The Registered Designs Ordinance is listed in the Schedule to the Intellectual Property Organization of Pakistan Act, 2012, so infringement suits are instituted before the IP Tribunal under section 18 of that Act, with an appeal to the High Court within thirty days (section 19). See our guide to IP Tribunal jurisdiction and procedure. Falsely marking an article as registered is an offence under section 29, and falsifying the register under section 28.

Cancellation of a registered design

Any interested person may seek cancellation under section 10(1) on three grounds: the substantive requirements of the Ordinance were not met (most often lack of novelty), the design is contrary to public order or morality, or the registered proprietor has no right to it. The petition may go to the High Court at any time after registration, or to the Registrar within two years of registration. Before the Registrar, the proprietor must file a counter-statement on Form D-8 within one month of notice, failing which the petition may be treated as unopposed (rule 19). An appeal from the Registrar’s order lies to the High Court (section 10(2)).

A defendant served with an infringement suit will often answer with a cancellation petition built on a prior-art search. The owner’s best protection is a search before filing, not after a dispute begins.

Copyright, trade marks, unregistered designs and foreign owners

Copyright. Section 12 of the Copyright Ordinance, 1962 says copyright does not subsist in a registered design. Where a design is capable of registration but is not registered, copyright in it ceases once an article bearing it has been reproduced “more than fifty times by an industrial process” by the owner or a licensee. The section still refers to the Patents and Designs Act, 1911, which the 2000 Ordinance largely replaced, but the policy is clear: mass-produced designs must be registered. See copyright protection in Pakistan.

Unregistered designs. Pakistan has no unregistered design right. A copied, unregistered product shape can sometimes be protected through passing off or trade dress, but that requires proof of reputation and likely confusion, which is harder and slower than relying on a registration.

Shape marks. The Trade Marks Ordinance, 2001 can protect a distinctive shape that indicates trade origin, but section 14(2) refuses signs consisting exclusively of a shape resulting from the nature of the goods, a shape necessary to obtain a technical result, or a shape that gives substantial value to the goods. For an attractive new product, a design registration is usually the first step; a shape mark may follow once the shape has become distinctive. See trademark registration in Pakistan.

Foreign owners. Pakistan is not a contracting party to the Hague Agreement; it does not appear in WIPO’s list of Hague members dated 14 July 2026. An international design registration cannot designate Pakistan. Instead, an applicant who first filed in a Convention country (a WTO member or a country notified under section 11) may file in Pakistan within six months and keep the earlier date (section 12). Rule 12 requires the certified priority copy within three months of filing.

Integrated circuits. Chip layouts are covered by a separate statute, the Registered Layout-Designs of Integrated Circuits Ordinance, 2000. It protects original layout-designs on registration, but only if the layout has not been commercially exploited, or has been exploited for no more than two years, when the application is made (section 7(2)). Protection ends at the end of the tenth calendar year after first commercial exploitation anywhere in the world (section 6).

Common questions

This article is general information about Pakistani law and procedure, not legal advice for any specific matter. If this touches on something you're currently facing, get in touch and we'll advise on your facts directly.