Multiple Designs in One Application in Nepal: How to Cover a Product Family
Multiple design applications in Nepal: can one Schedule 1(b) filing cover a product family, how representations limit scope, and the per-design fee math.
You have a product family: one bag shape in five colourways, a chair that comes in three variants, a bottle range sharing one visual idea. The question arrives with the budget: is this one design application or five?
In Nepal, the answer turns on what the representations show — because the Department of Industry protects what is depicted, not what is implied.
In short
Multiple designs in Nepal are safest treated as multiple applications: a Schedule 1(b) filing is built around one design's representations — four sets of identical images defining exactly what is claimed — and protection does not extend to variants the drawings leave out. Where several looks are genuinely one design shown across views, one filing can carry it; where the family contains distinct looks, each needs its own filing, its own NPR 1,000 application and NPR 7,000 registration, and eventually its own renewal decisions.
The rule that decides it: representations define scope
A design application in Nepal lives or dies on its representations — the drawings or images filed on Schedule 1(b) with four sets of identical images, plus particulars stating what is claimed. What the representations clearly show is protected; what they leave out is not. The Department does not protect a design 'and its variants': a colourway, a pattern change or a shape variant that never appears in the drawings sits outside the registration, however obviously it belongs to the family. That single principle answers most multiple-design questions before they are asked.
When one application can carry the family
One filing fits where the variants are genuinely one design: the same article shown from the angles needed — front, side, top, the detail views that carry the look — with the range's shared visual idea visible throughout. The particulars should state how the design applies, and each variant that matters commercially should be visible somewhere in the representations. What one filing cannot honestly do is bundle different designs: a teapot and the tray it sits on are two filings, as are a bag's three genuinely different silhouettes. The test practitioners apply is simple — if two products were knocked off, would one infringement argument cover both? If not, budget two filings.
| Situation | Filing approach | Why |
|---|---|---|
| One look, shown across views and detail shots | One Schedule 1(b) filing | The representations capture the whole design |
| Same look in colourways where colour is claimed | File the colour claim deliberately | Particulars must state colour is claimed, or it is not |
| Distinct silhouettes in one product family | One filing per distinct look | Scope follows what is depicted |
| Article + matching set pieces | Assess: one design or several | Each article's look must be shown and claimed |
Multiple design application arithmetic: fees and renewals
Design filings are cheap individually and multiply quickly as a family: NPR 1,000 application and NPR 7,000 registration per filing, and a five-look range is five registrations, five certificates and five renewal clocks. Each design runs 5 years from registration, renewable twice on Schedule 2(e) — within 35 days of each expiry, with a 6-month grace period carrying a NPR 1,000 fine — at NPR 1,000 per year in the first renewal term and NPR 2,000 in the second, to the absolute 15-year ceiling. Portfolio owners therefore renew by triage: the looks still shipping and still distinctive earn their renewals; the dated ones lapse deliberately.
The family-filing mistakes to avoid
The recurring errors are predictable, and each is avoidable at the design stage:
- Batching distinct looks into one filing — the representations cannot carry designs they do not show, and the unshown variants were never protected
- Filing after the catalogue prints — disclosure before filing invites copying and a copycat's earlier registration
- Incomplete representations per variant — a colourway or pattern change that matters commercially must be visible and claimed in the particulars
- Letting lapsed looks linger on the renewal calendar — family portfolios renew by triage, not by default
Planning a family filing before launch
The filing decision belongs at the design stage, before the catalogue prints: inventory the family's looks, decide which are commercially load-bearing, and file those before disclosure — a look revealed at a trade fair or in a catalogue before filing invites copying and, worse, a copycat's earlier registration on a first-to-file register. Where the family will grow, later additions file as they are designed; the register does not reward batching unrelated looks into one filing, but it reliably rewards complete representations for each look that matters.
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This article is general information, not legal advice.