According to statistics, China ranks No. 1 in the publishing volume and variety of newspaper and books; No. 2 in digital publishing volume and overall printing volume. (Source: China IP News)

Dec 9, 2015 at the State Council Executive Meeting, new measures are announced to reform and improve the existing IP system to enforce more rigorous IP protection. This is the first State Council executive meeting that was held focusing on IP subjectsince the beginning of 2015, whichhas reflected China government’s pressing needforsupporting the growth of innovative startups. In face of the recent economic growth slow-down, innovation and entrepreneurship are considered the keys to realizing a healthy long-term economic growth by Chinese government.

The new measures include establishment of express IP enforcement mechanism, strengthened support to infringement investigation and prosecution, increase of statutary indemnity amount, inclusion of deliberate infringement to the business’s and personal credit records, in other words, one couldpay a heavy price for life for any single infringement act.

Other than the hard strike on the plagiarists, it’s also announced on the executive meeting that financial support will be strengthened to provide free or low-cost public information on patents, trademarks and copyrights; and greater support will be given to IP protection in E-commerce, big data and other new technology fields. (Source: China News)

SIPO had signed data exchange agreements with JPO and KPO in 2008 and 2011 respectively. According to the agreements, the exchanged content includedcomplete texts, items of description and English Abstract etc.; and all exchanged data was limited for internal use and public service, excluding provision in batch.

According to the MOU, both parties will extend the cooperation onto the areas, such as promoting copyright education, training, as well as strengthening the communication and cooperation between top managements and working teams to plan for the direction of cooperation. (Source: The Paper)

In 2014, China’s trademark filing volume is 2.285 million, 3 times of 2008. In October 2015, China’s valid trademark registration hit 10 million pieces and stayed at the top of the world for the 14th consecutive year. Despite the strongest performance in volume, China doesn’t have quite many world-famous brands and the brands’ competiveness and impact in global markets are still weak.

Beyond doubt, the bilateral cooperation is not only beneficial to the two Offices, but also to the world at large. Thirty years ago, at the initial stage of SIPO, it was EPO who extended a helping hand, with which, the construction of Chinese patent system stepped out and developed from a relatively high level. In the past 30 years, the cooperation between the two offices has been expanded in many aspects. For instance, with the bilateral cooperation on search tools, the Chinese patent examiners got rid of manual search. Furthermore, the two sides have carried out other fruitful cooperation in fields of personnel training, patent documentation, machine translation, Cooperative Patent Classification, global dossier, etc. Meanwhile, the cooperation between the two Offices under the framework of WIPO and IP5, has effectively boosted the development and progress of the international IP system. Due to the continuous efforts of the two Offices, millions of patent documents written in Chinese and English are now available for access by engineers, inventors and scientists worldwide, in particular providing great convenience to industries, innovators and the general public from China and Europe.

As a Chinese saying goes, “Distance cannot separate true friends who feel so close even when they are thousands of miles apart”, due to continuous efforts of the leaders from China and Europe, SINO-European relationship has continued to deepen, which has provided new opportunities and now driving force for the cooperation between SIPO and EPO. “As long as we continue to work as hard as we always do, our cooperation will have a promising future; as long as we make progress together, it will contribute to grow. Let’s join our hands together to create a brighter future.”（Source：China Intellectual Property News）

Bradley Yu, president of Unitalen Attorneys at Law attended the event to receive the “Madrid International Registration Special Award” for Unitalen, which is given to acknowledge Unitalen’sassistance to Chinese businesses utilizing Madrid system in exceptionally effective manner, and it is the only domestic trademark agency that have received this award.

At the training, our senior attorney Pei Lu introduced the basic knowledge of patent to the business representatives,illustrated a fewpractical patent issues related to business, and helped them understand patent strategies, patent mappingand patent protection with case studies. Pei Lu also answered questions raised by the business representatives at the end of the training.

The training was provided to the dozens of life science companies situated in Zhongguancun Incubator Park to help them prevent IP risks.

An offer letter from SCIA is received to appoint our senior partner Mr. Yongbo Li as the arbitrator of their new commission (in conjunction of the appointment as High Tech IP Arbitration Center Arbitrator) for 3 years’ term, commencing December 1, 2015.

SCIA (or “Shenzhen Court of International Arbitration”) was founded in 1983 Shenzhen to solve disputes over contracts or other properties and rights involving overseas natural persons, legal representatives and other organizations. As one of the most important international arbitration centers in China,it is also the first arbitration organization in China that implementsstatutoryinstitution management model by adopting specialized legislation to establish the management structure with international administrative committee at the core.Currently the international arbitrators are over 40.6% in this organization.

August 6, 2014, Rhodia, a subsidiary of the Belgium-based multinational group Solvay, took legal action against Zhonghua Chemical and another Chinese company for infringement of its EP2222627B1 European patent and requested Hague regional court to issue a Cross Board Injunction to stop Zhonghua Chemical, et al from selling Vanillin in all the designated countries of its European patent.

Entrusted by Zhonghua Chemical, Simmons-Simmons (Holland) and Unitalen (China) reacted to the lawsuit proactively as a joint legal team, which included both Holland lawyers – Mr. Bas Berghuis, Mr. Mattie de Koning, and Chinese lawyers – Mr. Yongbo Li, Mr. Fanwen Kong and Mr. Zhaoling Li. The two firms partnered closely with each other to collect substantial evidences to prove Rhodia’s EP2222627B1 European patent doesn’t possess inventiveness and Zhonghua Chemical has adopted the production method that doesn’t constitute patent infringement. In November 21, 2014, Judge P.H. Bloc of The Hague Regional Court decided to reject Rhodia’s petition as the patent involved don’t possess inventiveness so it will be revoked. Rhodia was also requested to pay for Zhonghua Chemical’s attorney fee of 298,000 euros.

Rhodia appealed against the verdict with International Court of Justice in Hague. Due to the less strict rules on modification of patent claims under Holland Patent Law, which allows modifications to Claims even at the second-instance stage, Rhodia narrowed the scope of its claims so as to overcome the lack of inventiveness determined by the first-instance court.

After review, Judge M.Y. Bonneur, Judge R. Kalden and Judge C.J.J. van Nispen made the verdict of the second instance to re-confirm Rhodia’s patent involved doesn’t possess inventiveness and rejected its appeal. Rhodia is also ordered to pay for the 600,000 euros’ attorney fees for the two trails.

LAWYER PROFILE Mr. Fanwen Kong Partner, Unitalen Attorneys at Law

Mr. Kong possess B.S., Fourth Military Medical University –Medicine and M.Sc., Academy of Military Medical Sciences – Medicine degrees, and received Patent litigation training in world renown law firms such as Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner, LLP.

Before he became a patent agent and patent litigation lawyer, he had worked in Academy of Military Medical Sciences Hospital as a brain surgery doctor, with broad knowledge of Medicinal chemistry and solid surgery experience. In 2005 Mr. Kong went into patent career and became a patent litigation lawyer with specialization in medicinal chemistry and machines patents, as well as business law disputes, such as trade secrets. He’s represented many successful international patent litigation cases as the partner of Unitalen Attorneys at Law.