Lego and the System of Intellectual Property, 1955–2015

21 Pages Posted: 10 Mar 2016 Last revised: 29 Mar 2016

See all articles by Dan Hunter

Dan Hunter

King's College London - The Dickson Poon School of Law

Julian Thomas

Royal Melbourne Institute of Technolog (RMIT University)

Date Written: March 7, 2016

Abstract

This article traces the ways in which Lego has deployed a range of intellectual property regimes since it first developed the Lego system of interlocking bricks in the mid-1950s, in an effort to exert commercial control over its bricks and System of Play. With the bricks initially protected by patent, Lego has, at various times, used copyright, design, trade mark and trade secret laws in an attempt to prevent other firms from marketing competing interlocking bricks. As the patents have expired, Lego has moved from unitary forms of control over the brick, augmenting intellectual property law with more distributed mechanisms of control and governance. The article describes how the law has influenced the broader evolution of the company, where a focus on engineering has broadened into branding, and then digital media.

Keywords: Copyright, Designs, Licensing, Patents, Toys, Trade marks, Trade secrets

Suggested Citation

Hunter, Dan and Thomas, Julian, Lego and the System of Intellectual Property, 1955–2015 (March 7, 2016). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2743140 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2743140

Dan Hunter (Contact Author)

King's College London - The Dickson Poon School of Law ( email )

Somerset House East Wing
Strand
London, WC2R 2LS
United Kingdom

Julian Thomas

Royal Melbourne Institute of Technolog (RMIT University) ( email )

124 La Trobe Street
Melbourne, 3000
Australia

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