When companies think about intellectual property protection, they often focus on the product itself while overlooking the packaging that consumers often notice first. Yet for many consumer brands, distinctive packaging drives purchasing decisions, reinforces brand identity, and can be as recognizable as the product contained inside (just look at the recent example of Heinz-labeled products
On March 13, 2026, and effective immediately, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) published a notice of “Supplemental Guidance for Examination of Design Patent Applications Related to Computer-Generated Interfaces and Icons” in the Federal Register (“Supplemental Guidance”), with application to all design patent applications filed before, on, or after March 13, 2026. In short, the Supplemental Guidance establishes that when the title and claim identify a computer, computer system, or computer display panel as the article of manufacture, there is no longer a requirement to depict that article of manufacture in the drawing or drawings to ensure that a claimed design of a computer-generated interface or icon for that article of manufacture is patent-eligible subject matter. The Supplemental Guidance also opens the door for standalone design protection of projected, holographic, and virtual and augmented designs that appear on or are generated by an electronic device.
Continue Reading Leave the Article, Take the Design: USPTO Updates Guidance for Digital Designs to Drop the Depiction Requirement for Computer Screens
Each year on March 5, the U.S. design community celebrates National Industrial Design Day, a moment to recognize the professionals behind the products we use every day. First entered into the U.S. Congressional Record in 2015, the day acknowledges that industrial designers improve our lives in countless ways by shaping products that are not only functional, but also visually distinctive and commercially valuable. For businesses, great design is more than aesthetics; it is a strategic asset. Thoughtfully-designed products drive consumer recognition, brand loyalty, and significant revenue across industries.
Continue Reading Happy National Industrial Design Day
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit’s recent decision in Range of Motion Products v. Armaid is another reminder that, if care is not taken, design patent scope can be narrowed significantly in the U.S. through functionality analysis—often at the claim construction stage—and even result in summary judgment of non-infringement.
Continue Reading When “Functionality” Swallows Design Rights: A Caution for Design Patent Applicants
For many product-focused companies, design often is the product. Differentiation lives in surface ornamentation, overall look-and-feel, and visual details that drive purchasing decisions often long before utility is evaluated. Against that backdrop, many brands are reexamining copyright law as a faster, more flexible tool for protecting product aesthetics.
Continue Reading The Growing Role of Copyright in Product Design Protection
As we wrote about recently here, Examiners continue to rely on the USPTO’s current guidance on the definiteness standard set forth by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (“Federal Circuit”) in In re Maatita, 900 F.3d 1369, 1377 (Fed. Cir. 2018), that ignores the Federal Circuit’s broader instruction—reasonable certainty is all that is required to satisfy the requirements of 35 U.S.C. § 112, not the specific type or quantities of views that the Applicant has chosen to use.
Continue Reading Another Step Forward: Further Updates on In re Maatita and Design Definiteness
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has announced the rollout of DesignVision, an advanced AI‑powered image search tool now integrated into the examination system for U.S. design patent applications. According to the Official Gazette notice published July 16, 2025, DesignVision enables examiners to perform federated searches of U.S. and foreign industrial design and trademark databases—spanning over 80 registers—using only image inputs. Results are ranked by visual similarity, allowing faster and more precise prior art discovery. The notice clarifies that this tool is intended to augment existing textual search methods, not replace them.
Continue Reading AI Search Tool Coming to Design Patent Examination
Expedited Patent Issuance
Starting May 13, 2025, the USPTO has begun accelerating the issuance of patents after the issue fee has been paid. Specifically, the duration between the Issue Notification and the Issue Date will be reduced to approximately two weeks instead of the current three-week time period. The USPTO has noted that it has been able to implement this improvement in view of its technology modernization efforts. More information on this update can be found at the USPTO’s website here.
Continue Reading USPTO Expediting Design Patent Issuances and De-Expediting Design Examination
In 2024, design patent law encountered a couple of major changes: the implementation of a new design patent bar, and the upending of decades of obviousness law under 35 U.S.C. § 103 in view of the en banc United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC)’s decision in LKQ Corporation v. GM Global Technology Operations LLC, which we discussed here. Looking back at last year’s design patent issuance statistics, we now take the time to determine whether, if at all, the issuance numbers of U.S. design patents were impacted by these changes.
Continue Reading Recap of 2024 U.S. Design Patent Drama: Here’s What We Know Now
We are pleased to announce that Quarles has been ranked 10th in the 13th Annual Design Patent Toteboard for the number of design patents that we helped obtain issuance of in 2024 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. We assisted our clients in obtaining 163 U.S. design patents last year, an increase of over 20% compared to 2023.
Continue Reading Design Patent Toteboard