Category Archives: Patent

Key Points to Foreign Company’s IPR Litigation Preparation in China

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By Luo Yanjie

With the development of economy, China pays more and more attention to the protection of intellectual property. But whether the patent, trademark or copyright, a lot of high value intellectual property rights belong to foreign companies. Facing the still serious infringing situation, the civil lawsuit is still the most common and reliable means to strike infringement. As for foreign investors, what deserves the attention when preparing lawsuit materials? Today we would like to share the topic with readers as follows:

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Could Apple Use Objection to Jurisdiction to Prolong the Litigation Period?

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By Albert Chen

The most watched copyright battle between Chinese Writer Alliance (the “Alliance”) and Apple was heard in Beijing No.2 Intermediate People’s Court on the 11th of this month. You may have read our previous essay on the private hearing of the case, and in fact, Apple has also filed an objection to the jurisdiction in the case. Nonetheless, the application was refused by the intermediate court and upheld by the high court after appeal. The lawsuit has been delayed by procedure for nearly half a year, as favored by Apple. Today, we are going to introduce the regulation on the objection to civil jurisdiction in China.

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Has Apple Lost Opportunity of In-Camera Hearing on Its Case?

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By Albert Chen

The most watched dispute between Baidu (NASDAQ: BIDU) and Chinese Writers Alliance (the “Alliance”) is heard on 11th of October in Beijing No.2 Intermediate People’s Court. That lawsuit is filed following the battle against Baidu by the Alliance. Before the hearing on 11th, Apple applied to the court for the hearing in camera with the claim that the case is with trade secret related. After the consideration by the court, such an application was refused by the judge, yet it still decided the procedure may switch into be in private when one the interrogation involves the business secret. In today’s post, you may see our analysis on the “lawsuit in camera” in China.

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China’s Millionth Invention Patent, a Global Record Made in the Shortest Time

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As reported, China issued a patent certificate which marked the 1 millionth invention patent granted in the country. However, it only took China 27 years to achieve that amount in the invention patent since the nation’s first patent law took effect in 1985, and it’s also the record to make that achievement in the shortest time.

China spent 6 years to see her 10, 000th invention patent in 1991, and another 12 years to total 100, 000 invention patents (2003). But it only took the country 9 years to increase from 100, 000 invention to the 1 millionth (2012). So far as is known, till the end of the 2nd season of 2012, SIPO has received 3.114 million applications for invention patents, and of the 1 million granted by the middle of July, ,518,000 came from China.

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SINO-RUSSIA PPH Has Started from 1st July

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By Huang Mengren

The SINO-RUSSIA PPH program will start from this 1st July, this program is similar to those of SINO-USA and SINO-JAPAN. And the following is our past essay on the PPH program between China and other countries.

The Patent Prosecution Highway is Piloting in China

—introduction on PPH programs between China and USA, Japan

Recently, China government has speeded up the process of international patent cooperation. Currently, the Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) Program between China and several other countries has started or prepared to start. Among the cooperations, the Sino-Japan PPH is piloting from 1st November, 2011, the Sino-America PPH will be carried out on 1st December, 2011, and Sino-Korea program will start from March, 2012.

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Data of Copyright Infringement Combat from 2006 to 2010 in China

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By the Economic Daily, during 5 years from 2006 to 2010, the administrative punishment on piracy judged by the copyright offices of each level totaled 49, 416, 1,653 transferred to the judicial organ, 128, 493 illegal operating units have been cancelled, 3, 507 dens have been investigated and 317 million pieces are captured. And in addition to the daily supervision, the special act on infringement combat by the administrative organs have been conducted for continuous 5 years, special act on illegal preinstalled pc software for continuous 3 years and promotion of genuine software using in companies for continuous 5 years.

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How to Apply for Evidence Preservation for IPR Trials in China

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By Luo Yanjie

In an earlier Microsoft’s case of right protection (Note: the link is in Chinese), the company applied for the evidence preservation to the court after they found the piracy using by others, demanding the perpetuation covering the pirated Microsoft software installed in the computers in the defendant’s business place. The application was accepted by the court, who thereafter sealed and checked the computers claimed and found each apparatus has been installed at least 5 types of software of Microsoft. Whereby, Microsoft gains the compensation of more than 1 million yuan in the following trials.

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MOC: Data of IP Infringement Law Enforcement of this 1st Quarter in China

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By You Yunting

The Ministry of Commerce (MOC) reported on 12th the latest progress of the combat against the IPR infringement and knockoff production in 2012 in China. And today’s post is mainly about part of the data released on the conference.

By the preliminary statistics, during this January to April, the commerce law enforcement departments nationwide have investigated and punished those involved in 78,773 cases of intellectual property rights (IPR) infringement and counterfeits, with the money involved of 1, 810 million yuan, 44,371 settled , 1, 016 transferred to the judicial organ and 4,065 dens for counterfeit manufacture are smashed. Also during the period, the public security department investigated 7, 140 cases of infringement and counterfeits, with 9, 305 suspects were arrested and 161. 1 million yuan is involved. During January to April, the procuratorate approved the arrestment in 1, 743 infringement or counterfeits cases and on 3, 289 individuals, and prosecuted 2, 516 cases and 4, 870 individuals. And also in the same period, 2, 586 criminal cases relating to the IPR infringement and counterfeits are filed in the courts throughout the nation, 2, 021 were settled and 3, 170 individuals are covered by the effective sentences.

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China Permits Duplication of Life-saving Drugs at Lower Price

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By Albert Chen

According to the report of South China Morning Post, the latest revised Measures for the Compulsory Licensing for Patent Implementation (the “Measures”), which has come into effect from 1st May of 2012, China government may sign the compulsory license to the manufacture of the cheap copy of the patent drugs when in the urgency or exceptional conditions of the state, or for the public interests.

Also in the report, it points out that the action by China government is an alert to the world pharmacy industry when China is a prominent part to the global medicine market; especially currently we see a decline in the western countries. Meanwhile, the news also says, for the past decades, many Chinese medicine makers have been manufacturing the important drug ingredient exported to foreign counterparts, who however would afterwards sell the patent medicine made with the aforesaid ingredients to China at a high price which is hardly affordable to Chinese patients. Now China has been focused on its wrestling with foreign drug makers, especially as known, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria will no longer grant donation of AIDs prevention to China from 2013.

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Data on IPR Development in China, 2011

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In recent, the News Office of the State Council held a news conference (note: the link is in Chinese), releasing the data on China IPR development in 2011, and the details are as follows:

Under the unified deployment of special acts by the State Council in combating the IPR infringement and the production and selling of the fake and substandard products, the filed cases in the administration of each level are 155, 900 with the involved amount of CNY 3.43 billion, 1, 702 cases were transferred to judicial organs and 9, 135 shelters were shut down.

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To Accelerate Overseas Patent Layout by PPH System

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By the news released on the website of the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO), the PPH respectively between China and Japan, USA, Germany, South Korea has been launched for a test run of 1 year.

Then what is PPH? What benefit may company gain from it in the patent layout? DeBund Law Offices, the mother institution of our website, is qualified as the patent agency institution. Today, we invite Mr. Gao Shaoyi, who once worked in Huawei as the patent engineer to share us his understanding on the PPH sysem.

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Introduction to the China Patent Exploitation License Contract Record System

Recently, our lawyers are consulted for the necessity and attentive point of patent exploitation license record, and as a professional patent agency qualified by the administration, DeBund Law Offices provides the service of application of the license contract record for the global client in China. Today we will introduce the system of the paten exploitation license contract record in China.

I. The function of the administrative record

1. The information disclosure

For the data coming from the patent exploitation license record, the State Intellectual Property Organization (“SIPO”) has established a special data base, which is available for public check. And in addition, for the registered data, SIPO also makes the record on Patent Register and will also make a publication on the Patent Gazzete.

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China Supreme People’s Court: Latest IPR Related Cases Data of 2011 in China

The Supreme People’s Court (SPC) of China released the latest data of IPR cases in 2011

In 2011, the number of first instance civil intellectual property cases accepted and disposed by local courts grew by 38.86% and 39.51% to 59,612 and 58,201 respectively.

Among the cases accepted in 2011, 7,819 were patent cases, up 35.16% year-on-year;

12,991 were trademark cases, up 53.56% year-on-year;

35,185 were copyright cases, up 42.34% year-on-year;

557 were technology contract cases, down 16.87% year-on-year;

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Why Apple Store’s Design Patent Application is Not Necessary? II

The post will be published on our website for two days, and today is the second half of it. (the image is the picture of Apple Store in Lujiazui from the www.apple.com.cn)

III. The legal risk in the lawsuit filed against design infringement

Furthermore, once Apple initiate the lawsuit basing on the design, it may be trapped in the patent validity and serial lawsuits, and it’s also a common challenge of patent lawsuits in China.

1. The poor stability of design patent

Despite the design patent is granted by the administration after approval, the organ will not examine the novelty and creativity of the patent applied for it being instable at all. For example, in the design dispute between SECO and HONDA (note: the link is in Chinese), when HONDA sued against SECO for the claimed plagiarism of SECO’s S-RV to its CR-V, the defendant filed the application of patent validity, and present the evidence including the previous design patent applied by HONDA.

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