Section 55. Design patents and patents for utility models. —

(a) Any new, original, and ornamental design for an article of manufacture and (b) any new model of implements or tools or of any industrial product, or of part of the same, which does not possess the quality of invention, but which is of practical utility by reason of its form, configuration, construction or composition, may be protected by the author thereof, the former by a patent for a design and the latter by a patent for a utility model, in the same manner and subject to the same provisions and requirements as relate to patents for inventions in so far as they are applicable, except as otherwise herein provided.

The standard of novelty established by section nine hereof for inventions shall apply to ornamental designs.

A utility model shall not be considered 'new' if, before the application for a patent, it has been publicly known or publicly used in this country, or has been described in a printed publication or publications circulated within the country, or if it is substantially similar to any other utility model so known, used or described within the country.

Applications for design patents and patents for utility models shall be subject to interference proceedings as authorized in section ten of this Act, as amended by section one of Republic Act Numbered Six hundred and thirty-seven.

Patents for designs and for utility models shall be subject to compulsory license as authorized in section thirty-four of this Act. They shall not be subject to the payment of annual fees provided for invention patents in Chapter V hereof.