Jan 16 – 29, 2018 

Here are some updates on IP developments in China from past two weeks.

1. China criticizes US moves on intellectual property 商务部:缺少确凿证据无可信度 China on Thursday criticized recent moves by the U.S. targeting the sale of fake goods and Chinese telecoms equipment, saying Washington lacked “objectivity” in its approach to Chinese businesses. Commerce Ministry spokesman Gao Feng told reporters the U.S. Trade Representative lacked direct conclusive evidence and supporting data in listing three Chinese online commerce platforms and six physical bazaars within China as “notorious markets” engaging in commercial-scale copyright piracy and trademark counterfeiting. Meanwhile, Alibaba Group recently released a series of initiatives to strengthen its intellectual property rights protection. The event happened days after Taobao was put listed as notorious market. The ecommerce giant intends to gather as much information as they can and use the expertise of both brands and rights holder to create a much stronger database. It should effectively improve the algorithm that Alibaba uses to counteract the fakes and even gather evidence for offline investigations. Moreover, Preempting the 2017 USTR report’s publication by one day, the company has released the 2017 Alibaba Intellectual Property Protection Annual Report (in Chinese).
2. Google announces patent agreement with Tencent amid China push Alphabet Inc’s Google has agreed to a patent licensing deal with Tencent Holdings Ltd as it looks for ways to expand in China where many of its products, such as app store, search engine and email service, are blocked by regulators. The agreement with the Chinese social media and gaming firm Tencent covers a broad range of products and paves the way for collaboration on technology in the future, Google said on Friday, without disclosing any financial terms of the deal. Additional articles are available here and here.
3. China Publishes More Scientific Articles Than the U.S. For the first time, China has overtaken the United States in terms of the total number of science publications, according to statistics compiled by the US National Science Foundation (NSF). According to the report, China published more than 426,000 studies in 2016, or 18.6% of the total documented in Elsevier’s Scopus database. That compares with nearly 409,000 by the United States. India surpassed Japan, and the rest of the developing world continued its upward trend.
4. SIPO Released Statistics Data on Major Work for 2017国家知识产权局公布2017年主要工作统计数据 SIPO recently released detailed breakdown of statistics on its work for 2017. Government data show that the number of annual applications for invention patents filed in the country topped 1.38 million in 2017, a 14.2 percent rise on the previous year. Beijing, Shanghai and Jiangsu are the top 3 provinces for number of patents per 10,000 people. State Grid Corporation of China, Huawei, and Sinopec are top companies with most patents granted.
5. China’s trademark applications hit record high in 2017 China’s trademark applications exceeded 5.7 million last year, up 55.7 percent year on year, both setting record highs. At the end of 2017, China had 14.92 million qualified registered trademarks, the most of any country worldwide.
6. “Jianwang [Swordnet] 2017” closed 2554 Pirated Websites“剑网2017”关闭侵权盗版网站2554个National Copyright Administration, State Internet Information Office, MIIT and Ministry of Public Security jointly held a conference on “Jianwang” special campaign recently. Since this special act being implemented in July 2017, 63,000 websites have been investigated and 2554 infringing websites have been closed. According to officer from National Copyright Administration, this special act had a focus on videos, news, mobile Internet applications (APP) and e-commerce platform.
7. China Will Take the Lead in Promoting IP Protection Mechanism in Pilot Area我国将在全面创新改革试验区域推进知识产权保护改革率先突破 NDRC recently issued a notice to promote reform on IP protection mechanism in eight pilot areas, including Jing Jin Ji, Shanghai, Guangdong, Anhui, Sichuan, Wuhan, Xi’an, Shenyang. The government intends to promote integrated management of IP rights, explore new mechanism of IP protection, and establish a new mechanism to link administrative and criminal enforcement.
8. U.S.-China IP Scholar Dialogue was Held中美知识产权学者对话举行 The Fourth U.S.-China IP Scholar Dialogue was held in Shanghai, China from January 17 to 18. Intellectual property is a key issue in the development of U.S.-China economic and trade relations. To increase cooperation and understanding, IP experts from both countries created this dialogue mechanism since 2013. This year’s dialogue emphasized on AI, biomedical innovation, technology licensing, trade secret law reform, IP judiciary protection and dispute settlement mechanism.
9. US Commerce Secretary Ross says Beijing’s technology strategy is a “direct threat”; China demurs.  US trade authorities are investigating whether there is a case for taking action over China’s infringements of intellectual property, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said. China responds that it did not expect more trade disputes.
10. China Customs reports seizing infringing goods worth 552 mln yuan in past three years.   China has seized infringing goods worth 552 million yuan (86.06 million U.S. dollars) in the past three years driven by a special act called “Qingfeng” (“Clear Breeze”), according to the General Administration of Customs of China (GACC). The three-year crackdown on intellectual property rights infringement discovered about 120 million infringing items, according to the General Administration of Customs.  Compare prior discussion on previous reports of GACC hereand here.
11. Beijing to set up IPR center to better serve high-tech firms.  Beijing will establish a center this year dedicated to providing services to high-tech companies on intellectual property rights (IPR), officials said. The center will offer fast-track services for patent applications to companies in information technology and high-end equipment production, two areas with the highest demand.  This is part of an existing SIPO effort to fast track areas of concern to industrial development.  Compare, however, article 27 of TRIPS Agreement – patents shall be available and patent rights enjoyable without discrimination as to the place of invention, the field of technology and whether products are imported or locally produced.
12. SIPO released a directory of industries that need IP support.  SIPO recently released the 2018 Intellectual Property Supporting Industries Directory (知识产权重点支持产业目录（2018年本）), which identified 10 industries where IP will be key. The government asked for efficient allocation of IP resources within these industries to promote industrial restructuring and upgrading.
13. China’s Sinovel Convicted in U.S. of Stealing Trade Secrets.  A Chinese wind turbine maker, Sinovel Wind Group Co. was found guilty of orchestrating the theft in a rare trial in Wisconsin that continues to raises doubts over China’s commitment to fighting infringement of intellectual property and corporate espionage.  The case is U.S. v. Sinovel Wind Group Co. Ltd., 13-cr-00084, U.S. District Court, Western District of Wisconsin (Madison). The conviction was against Sinovel Wind Group.  Previously a former employee of the victim had been found guilty of theft of trade secrets in a criminal case in Austria. In addition, there are in total five civil cases in China between Sinovel and AMSC, with one closed and four pending. AMSC filed one separate trade secret case in China plus two copyright cases and an arbitration.
14.   Five New Guiding Cases (English translation available).  Of the five newly released GCs, four are administrative cases and one centers on a dispute over the infringement of rights related to a new plant variety (Case No. 92). English translation of those guiding cases are made available by the China Guiding Case Project of Stanford Law School. More information about previous guiding cases available here and here.

We hope to be providing more updates in the year ahead from UC Berkeley.  As usual, the information herein does not necessarily represent the opinion of any government agency, company, individual or the University of California.

Updated: February 13, 2018