The plaintiff argued that, by marketing ready-made dishes in self-heating packagings under the trademark QUICK CUISINE, SEVIM infringed several registered design rights owned by a third party and used by a competing company.

The Paris Court of Appeal confirmed the invalidity of the designs considering that they were dictated merely by their technical features and therefore deprived of original character.

Hence, the infringement and unfair competition claims were rejected and the company SEVIM was awarded damages as a counterclaim.