Browsing thru a recent edition of the Danish Utilitiy Moldel publication I came across an invention where my first thought was “I want one of thoseâ€. That is very rare since many utility models are pretty useless and obvious (no offense meant).
The invention I came across was a collapsible wheel barrow. To my surprise Christian Friis Bach – Danish Minister of development – was the inventor.
Investigating the invention I found out although the invention is protected in Denmark as a utility model it has been given free to the developing world as the “World barrowâ€. On a webpage for the invention it is described as an “open source†project – designed to be produced free of charge in developing countries.
This is a good example of mixing IP protection in one place and letting the invention free in another place.
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