- 1. Design drawings and products are transformed from plane to plane, and there is a strict one-to-one correspondence between the diagram and the product.
- 2. The reproduction of the design diagram necessarily accompanies the circuit board manufacturing process.
- 3. There is a strict one-to-one correspondence between the circuit wiring diagram and the component arrangement diagram.
- Written in the end
Competitors using reverse engineering to copy our hard-designed products has been an inevitable way of competition in the market nowadays. Therefore, we also need to know more about the patent protection of PCB design. This will maximize the protection of our intellectual property rights.
In the printed circuit board industry, circuit wiring diagrams and component arrangement diagrams, as important design drawings in the manufacture of printed circuit boards, compared with the manufacture of other products, have certain special characteristics. This article is on the special nature of PCB design to analyze the situation and think about how to avoid being used by competitors to copy our PCB design reverse engineering.
1. Design drawings and products are transformed from plane to plane, and there is a strict one-to-one correspondence between the diagram and the product.
Regarding the circuit wiring diagram, to achieve electrical performance, the metal wiring on the printed circuit board and the realization of a well-designed circuit wiring diagram are in strict one-to-one correspondence. The width, orientation, relative position, and punching holes of its wiring must be proportionally identical to complete the final plugging of components, thus achieving electrical functionality. To ensure one-to-one correspondence accuracy, the printed circuit board manufacturing process uses a process similar to a photo flip to etch the designed circuit wiring diagram onto the board.
As for the component arrangement diagram, the manufacturing process is purely to print the pre-designed component arrangement diagram proportionally on the circuit board to mark the information, such as the components and other interfaces to be inserted in the corresponding parts, so that the components can be inserted and maintained manually. Therefore, from the surface of the circuit board can be intuitively seen the product on arrangement of components is completely from graphics to graphics simple copy, but the medium and carrier from paper to circuit boards.
2. The reproduction of the design diagram necessarily accompanies the circuit board manufacturing process.
According to the manufacturing process of printed circuit boards, the circuit wiring diagram must be made in a specific format before the production of electronic files (the so-called GERBER file), and then in the production process of circuit wiring diagrams copied to the film (the so-called film), and then use the film through a certain process etching to the circuit board. This is the only procedure that must be followed in the industrial production of circuit boards. Diagrams are similar for the reproduction of component arrangement but do not need to be etched out but directly printed on the circuit board.
3. There is a strict one-to-one correspondence between the circuit wiring diagram and the component arrangement diagram.
A circuit board is designed as a whole, so all the circuit wiring diagrams and component arrangements between two boards should be different. All the circuit wiring diagrams and component arrangements must be identical between two identical boards. Although the circuit board in the wiring may be divided into different layers, the wiring diagram between each layer is often the existence of a unique correspondence between the wiring diagram and the arrangement of components is also the existence of a unique correspondence between all of these design diagrams with the use of the final design and manufacture of a circuit board to complete.
These two unique correspondence makes it possible to infer that the same drawing will inevitably lead to the same other drawings; the same physical wiring diagram and component arrangement diagram will inevitably lead to the same intermediate files (such as GERBER files and film). That is to say; there is a unique, identical correspondence between the physical object, intermediate files, and original drawings. Such an inference can be established either in the forward or reverse direction. This is especially true for computer motherboards, which are more technically complex, have many components, and are arranged in a compact design.
Reproduction behaviour is specifically reflected as follows.
The arrangement of components is entirely in the form of printing from graphics to graphics reproduction, in line with the relevant laws on the reproduction provisions; the difference is only the media and carrier changes in the graphical presentation without any differences.
For circuit wiring diagrams, their reproduction is mainly reflected in the following two aspects.
(1) Through the above analysis, we see a unique correspondence between the physical wiring, the film and the original design drawing, so the similarity of the two physical objects can be inferred that the drawings used by both parties are substantially similar. Thus, both parties must have copied similar drawings onto the film, forming a similar drawing to prepare for the next step of manufacturing the board. Although this copying process often occurs in professionally printed circuit board manufacturers rather than directly by the designer, according to the current process of manufacturing circuit boards, such a copy is bound to exist.
(2) The original drawing of the wiring etched into the circuit board is also a form of reproduction.
According to the wiring diagram, manufacturing circuit boards and other product design drawings based on the implementation of the manufacture of other products are two completely different processes due to the unique properties of such products as circuit boards and their special manufacturing process. The difference between the two types of behaviour is mainly reflected in the following aspects.
a. According to the relevant legal provisions, generally known as the manufacture of products based on product design drawings, often from flat drawings to three-dimensional physical transformation and implementation, the drawings of symbols, lines, logos, and other information needs to be understood by people to transform the physical structure, connections, etc. Therefore, from the abstract expression of the drawings to the concrete expression of the physical between the intellectual labour of people must be. Otherwise, it can not be directly transformed. The physical object results from human intellectual labour based on the original drawing.
The wiring of the circuit board is different from this. The transformation between the drawing and the physical object is from plane to plane. The transformation from the drawing to the physical object is a mechanical process in which the abstract expression of the symbols, lines, logos and other information on the drawing and the expression of the symbols, lines, logos and other information on the physical object is a completely mechanical one-to-one correspondence, without the need for human intellectual labour. The physical object results from mechanical reproduction based on the original drawing.
b. Generally speaking, according to the product design drawings manufacturing products, in the product manufacturing process, the drawing itself is not the machine processing object, not involved in industrialized machine processing, but only for people to read and understand to control the production and manufacture of products.
In the circuit board manufacturing process, the drawing itself is the processing object of the machine, rather than just for people to read and understand the technical information. Once the layout is determined, it enters the mechanized reproduction process; the symbols, lines, logos and other information on the drawing are no longer meaningful to people; no need for people to read or understand it, only the machine to identify it, and purely mechanized one-to-one accurate reproduction.
Therefore, based on these analyses, the production of circuit boards is a mechanical reproduction of circuit wiring diagrams, similar to the photographic reproduction process. The difference is that the photograph is reproduced from the film to the paper, while the circuit board manufacturing is reproduced from the film to the insulation board; only the two processes and carriers differ. According to the relevant laws called the production of industrial products by product design drawings, it is right to exclude this purely mechanical reproduction of the situation.
A Circuit board is another circuit wiring diagram with insulating material as the carrier and metal wire as the medium. After the wiring design drawings are copied to the insulating board and then produced into a circuit board, the board can become an industrial product because the lines on the drawing are changed from an ink medium to a metal medium, thus making these lines have a conductive function to meet the functional requirements of a special product such as a circuit board. This shows that the conductive function is caused by the physical properties of these lines, not by the processing. In other words, the medium chosen in the reproduction process gives the board the properties of an industrial product. This process is similar to transforming and reproducing a written work or drawing onto a copper plate. The difference in media alone is not enough to form two works.
The industry believes that the provisions of the relevant laws cannot be inferred the other way around, i.e., it cannot be assumed that any performance of construction and production of industrial products with practical value is necessarily not a reproduction. This point is often easy to be confused and ignored. The crux of the matter lies in understanding what kind of things can be called industrial products, what kinds of things are works as referred to in the Copyright Law, and how to belong to “construction and production by engineering design, product design drawings and their instructions”. If the reproduced copies have the practical value of industrial products, they should also be considered reproductions.
After the amendment, the Copyright Law deleted the exclusion mentioned above of reproduction. It only provided the meaning of reproduction in the name of the reproduction right in a positive way by way of enumeration, but this has not eliminated such problems. Although we are not very clear about the specific intent of the legislator to delete this express provision, I think such a legislative change will at least cause the potential abusers of this provision to lose a clear legal basis.
On this point, the circuit board is a good example, and there are other examples. For example, suppose this drawing is directly usable as a tool in production. In that case, e.g., a drawing drawn on paper with one of the elements of light and dark, colour, and line, or a combination thereof, is copied directly onto film. Light and dark elements, colour, and lines have technical significance and can be recognized by a machine. These films may become industrial products that can be produced, used, and sold independently, so are they reproductions or not? The result is obvious. If this industrial product can be replaced by other industrial products, such as the medium is changed to the same insulating board as the circuit board, and the same conductor replaces the factors of light and dark, colour and line as the circuit board instead of ink, if this does not affect its practical value, it can also be produced, used and sold independently as an industrial product. Using an insulating board and metal conductor has no additional technical significance in this industrial product; then, Is it a copy? Is the film a copy of such industrial products, replaced by insulating materials and conductors that do not belong to the copy?
Therefore, to examine whether it is a reproduction in the legal sense, we cannot simply judge whether the final product is an industrial product or not. Still, we have to examine whether the production process of industrial products includes reproduction from the substance and whether industrial products and reproduction are not mutually exclusive and incompatible concepts. At the same time, it cannot be judged simply by whether the reproduced work is a work of aesthetic value or practical and technical significance.
Through the above analysis, we can draw the following conclusions.
1. Print circuit boards’ design and manufacturing process will produce objects for copyright protection, especially various product design drawings.
2. the process of producing and manufacturing circuit boards using circuit board wiring diagrams and component arrangement diagrams is the process of copying these drawings. The manufactured circuit boards should be regarded as copies of the drawings.
3. two similar circuit boards in kind can be directly and indirectly inferred whether the infringement of the copy.
Written in the end
This article describes the special characteristics of PCB design; we want to avoid being a competitor to copy our design through reverse engineering. Understanding this article on PCB design in the law of some special features is very necessary. If you do not want to design your PCB, you can work with a PCB manufacturer who can design; Anpllopcb is a new company with PCB design and manufacturing. Also want to know more about PCB design intellectual property, please continue reading “how you should be printed circuit board intellectual property protection.