Legal Protection of Vessel Hull Designs and Related Technology

Abstract

Abstract Those who develop own or license vessel hull designs and related technologyhave a number of options available to protect their technology, research, anddevelopment in the United States. Traditionally protection has been obtainedthrough the cardinal points of intellectual property law - namely, patent, copyright, trade secret, and to some extent trademark law. With the enactmentof the Vessel Hull Design Protection Act ("VHDPA") in 1998, aneffective, quick and inexpensive means of protecting vessel hull designs in the United States has become available to both small and large design firms. Introduction Those who develop own or license vessel hull designs and related technologyhave a number of options available to protect their technology, research, anddevelopment in the United States. Traditionally protection has been obtainedthrough the cardinal points of intellectual property law - namely, patent, copyright, trade secret, and to some extent trademark law. With the enactmentof the Vessel Hull Design Protection Act ("VHDPA") in 1998, aneffective, quick and inexpensive means of protecting vessel hull designs in the United States has become available to both small and large design firms. The Cardinal Points. The present patent laws are directed at protecting newand useful machines, processes, composition of matter (e.g. chemicals), andornamental designs. The copyright laws provide protection for an originalexpression of an idea - but not the idea itself. Federal and state trademarklaws protect any word, name, symbol, device, slogan, nonfunctional design orcombination thereof that identifies and distinguishes a specific product orservice from others in the market place. Trade secret law protects anyconfidential information that provides a competitive advantage to a company orperson. As discussed below, each cardinal point provides, to varying degrees, protection for vessel hull designs and related technology. VHDPA-New Direction. In contrast to the cardinal points, the VHDPA providesan effective, quick and inexpensive means to protect vessel hull designs, irrespective of whether the shape is a function of creative endeavor and/orutility. The Act further represents a cautious but new direction of protectingindustrial designs in the United States - namely vessel hull designs.