Can you copy a product of someone else?

By Janine Hollesen, Director

This question was all over social media and media reports when the owner of Ubuntu Baba used the power of social media to bring to the attention of the South African public, its copying allegations against Woolworths in relation to a baby carrier. This again illustrates the legs which social media has to carry a story of this nature.

The bottom line is that it is not unlawful to copy another person’s product or idea, provided that it is not protected by a form of intellectual property, such as patents, designs, copyright, trade marks or in the get-up of the product.

This issue has been more fully dealt with in our Legal Werks article which can be found here.