Patent news: Improvements to protective packaging

Damage to products while in transit can be significantly detrimental to businesses, not only in terms of cost and environmental impact, but also reputational damage resulting from a poor customer experience. Innovative packaging solutions can play a key role in reducing and mitigating this potential damage.

One example of a packaging solution designed to provide improved protection is described in EP4116221, granted this year to Ricoh Company Ltd. The patented solution provides a shock absorbing structure aimed at reducing the damage caused by vibration or drop impact when distributing electronic products, such as printers, copiers and fax machines.

Interestingly, the patented invention is based on an existing solution (shown in figure 1). In this known solution, a product is packaged in a base structure and a shock-absorbing rib is provided at an outer surface of the base. The rib is designed to absorb compressive stresses by deforming, thereby reducing the risk of damage to the packaged product.

 The patented invention looks to improve on the known solution by enhancing the shock-absorbing properties of the packaging.

 This is done by introducing an auxiliary buffer, which is designed to act as an additional shock-absorbing structure (feature 14 in Figure 2). The auxiliary buffer is supported on the base structure (10) of the packaging at both ends, whilst spaced apart from the base. For example, the auxiliary buffer might have an inverted v-shape, as is shown in Figure 2, although the patent is broad enough in scope to cover a range of shapes.

Whilst the original shock-absorbing rib reduces the impact of compression forces, the new auxiliary buffer is designed to deform to absorb both bending and compression forces. This action provides improved protection against damage of the packaged product.

The improved design was found to be about 20 per cent more effective at absorbing the shock of an impact compared to the original packaging (in Figure 1), thereby providing significantly enhanced protection for packaged objects in transit.

Although relatively simple, Ricoh Company Ltd was able to demonstrate a technical advantage associated with their improved packaging solution, and therefore was granted European patent protection.

 The granted patent demonstrates that even incremental improvements to a known product can be protected. Provided the improvement gives rise to a technical benefit, or enhances an existing benefit, then the improvement itself may be patentable.

Patenting incremental improvements can be beneficial to prevent copying by competitors, generate revenue through licensing, whilst also demonstrating that a company is innovative, which can be a useful marketing tool. Additionally, a granted patent can be used to claim tax relief under the HMRC’s Patent Box scheme, which can reduce the patentee’s corporation tax liability and offset the cost of obtaining patent protection.

Before launching a product that is an improvement to a known product it is essential to consider whether the known product is already the subject of a granted patent. If it is, then there is a risk that the improved product could be found to infringe, even if the improved solution is itself patented. Care must be taken to identify any third-party rights that might exist, and either avoid these or look to obtain a licence before going ahead.