A couple of months ago I received a nice accessory which looked cool but had some flaws imo, so I decided to fix them and create a new product. Did my 2D drawings and found a guy to convert them into 3D, so I can 3D print my prototype. I decided to find a factory in China to manufacture it, so I went to Alibaba, found similar products, looked up who makes them ( and their rating ) and contacted them. Question is, how do I protect my product? By that I mean, what if one day I search Alibaba and see a copy of my product being offered by a few other factories, or by that same factory I used? I live in Canada and my understanding is ( correct me if I'm wrong ) that Canadian patent won't do a thing in China. Plus I was told it takes forever to patent. So what do I do? Copyright it? Patent in China ( possible? how? ), make a factory sign contract which prevents them from making that product for anyone but me? It's going to be a very cheap ( under or $10 ) item, with relatively small profit margin, which makes me wonder if I should bother with patenting at all.
Another question I have is - what if someone patented a certain design of, let's say spray bottle, and I am about to create another spray bottle with a completely new design ( only common part they have is that they are both spray bottles ) - can a company which makes that first bottle go after me ? They can't just patent "spray bottle" concept and prevent everyone else from making any kind of spray bottles, right?
Another question I have is - what if someone patented a certain design of, let's say spray bottle, and I am about to create another spray bottle with a completely new design ( only common part they have is that they are both spray bottles ) - can a company which makes that first bottle go after me ? They can't just patent "spray bottle" concept and prevent everyone else from making any kind of spray bottles, right?
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