US, Japan Join WIPO’s Hague System Global Registry of Industrial Designs

The U.S. and Japan joined the Hague system for the global registration of industrial designs, adding "two of the world’s biggest economies" to a registry “that supports creators worldwide,” the World Intellectual Property Organization said in an announcement Friday. According to statistics from WIPO, which runs the registry, 8.2 percent of all design applications worldwide in 2013 were filed by applicants from the U.S., and 4.7 percent by applicants in Japan, the agency said. WIPO hopes other countries will consider joining the Hague system now that the U.S. and Japan have, it said. WIPO touts the 64-country-strong Hague system as offering a cost-effective means of registering industrial designs in a large number of countries, “providing design owners broad geographical protection of their designs with a minimum of formality and expense.” A Hague registration “produces the same effect of a grant of protection in each of the designated contracting parties as if the design had been registered directly with each national office, unless protection is refused by the national office,” WIPO said.