Construction firm convicted of copying accommodation cabins

A Finnish district court has convicted the managing director of a construction company and a representative of a design firm for copyright infringement after they reused cabin designs without permission at two separate sites.

The Central Finland District Court ruled that the designs for the cabins, originally commissioned for a hotel in Inkoo, were protected by copyright held by the hotel and its architect. The construction company had ordered 20 cabin frames but used only 13 at the hotel, repurposing the remaining seven at a site in Sastamala.

The court ordered each defendant to pay €35,000 in compensation to both the hotel owner and the architect. They were also required to return or destroy the digital models of the cabin designs. The construction company’s managing director and the design firm’s representative received 80 day-fines, amounting to approximately €5,000 and €4,300 respectively based on their incomes.

The defendants argued that the hotel owner had not explicitly prohibited the reuse of the designs and that the cabins did not qualify as copyright-protected works. However, the court determined that the copyright belonged to the hotel and the architect, as the defendants’ work was limited to technical drawings not eligible for protection.

The case also involved a comparison with the Arctic Treehouse Hotel in Rovaniemi, but the Finnish Copyright Council concluded those structures were independent works. The construction company, MC Construction, and design firm Arcineer have announced they will appeal the ruling.