Article 12 — Commencement and term of protection of an unregistered EU design

1. A design which meets the requirements laid down in Section 1 shall be protected by an unregistered EU design for a period of three years from the date on which the design was first made available to the public within the Union. 2. For the purposes of paragraph 1, a design shall be deemed to have been made available to the public within the Union if it has been published, exhibited, used in trade or otherwise disclosed in such a way that, in the normal course of business, those events could reasonably have become known to the circles specialised in the sector concerned, operating within the Union. The design shall not, however, be deemed to have been made available to the public for the sole reason that it has been disclosed to a third person under explicit or implicit conditions of confidentiality.