Category Archives: Trade Secrets

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SPC’s 2020 IP-Related Judicial Interpretation Agenda

On March 19, 2020, the Supreme People’s Court’s Judicial Interpretation Agenda for 2020 (“2020 Judicial Interpretation Agenda”) 最高人民法院2020年度司法解释立项计划 was discussed and adopted by the SPC Trial Committee at its 1795th meeting on March 9, 2020. In 2020, there are 49 judicial interpretation (JI) projects, divided into two categories: 38 in the Class I Projects, which are required to be completed by the end of 2020; 11 in the Class II Projects, which are required to be completed in the first half of 2021. Generally speaking, the complete catalogue covers various fields such as the enforcement, security, pre-litigation property preservation, civil code, criminal cases, administrative cases and judicial appraisal. There are a number of  IP-related projects, all of which involve the recently established national Intellectual Property Court as a drafting and research partner with other SPC divisions or tribunals, and suggest an increasingly important role for this specialized court in IP policy making:   

Class I Projects (to be completed before the end of 2020) 

  1. Several Provisions on Evidence in Civil Procedures of Intellectual Property 关于知识产权民事诉讼证据的若干规定 [ As previously noted, this draft was discussed at a conference hosted by the SPC in Hangzhou in 2018. As Chinese courts experiment with more expanded discovery, evidence preservation and burden of proof reversals, clearer rules regarding the obligations of parties to produce evidence are becoming more critical. ]

 Organizers: Civil Adjudication Tribunal No.3, Civil Adjudication Tribunal No.1, Research Office, Intellectual Property Court 

  1. Interpretation of Several Issues concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Administrative Cases for Patent Validity 关于审理专利授权确权行政案件适用法律若干问题的解释 [Note: A draft was issued for public comment in the summer of 2018; see the earlier blog].

 Organizers: Civil Adjudication Tribunal No.3, Intellectual Property Court 

  1. Interpretations of Several Issues concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Trade Secret Secret Infringement Cases 关于审理侵犯商业秘密纠纷案件适用法律若干问题的解释 [Note: Regarding the Interpretations of Several Issues concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Trade Secret Infringement Cases, it was also on SPC’s 2019 JI Agenda. As mentioned in Susan Finder’s November 26, 2019, blogpost, this judicial interpretation is flagged in the Party/State Council document (November, 2019) on improving intellectual property rights protection with a goal to “explore and strengthen effective protection of trade secrets, confidential business information and its source code etc. Strengthen criminal justice protection and promote the revision and the amendment and improvement of criminal law and judicial interpretations 探索加强对商业秘密、保密商务信息及其源代码等的有效保护。加强刑事司法保护，推进刑事法律和司法解释的修订完善.”]

Organizers: Civil Adjudication Tribunal No.3, Criminal Adjudication Tribunal No.1, Intellectual Property Court [Note the involvement of the Criminal Adjudication Tribunal is a positive sign for seeking an integrated civil/criminal/administrative enforcement approach] 

  1. Provisions on Several Issues concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Pharmaceutical Patent Linkage Dispute Cases 关于审理药品专利链接纠纷案件适用法律若干问题的规定 [Note: this appears consistent with the requirement for adopting a patent linkage system in the Phase 1 IP Agreement.  As we have discussed in a previous blog, the Pharmaceutical-Related Intellectual Property section of the Phase 1 IP Agreement requires China to adopt a patent linkage system, much as was originally contemplated in the CFDA Bulletin 55, but subsequently did not appear in the proposed patent law revisions of late 2018]

(New Project)

Organizers: Civil Adjudication Tribunal No.3, Case Filing Tribunal, Intellectual Property Court  

  1. Provisions on Several Issues concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Civil Dispute Cases Arising from Monopolistic Conduct (二) 关于审理因垄断行为引发的民事纠纷案件应用法律若干问题的规定(二) (New Project)

 Organizers: Intellectual Property Court, Civil Adjudication Tribunal No.3

 Class II Projects (to be completed in the first half of 2021)

  1. Provisions on Several Issues concerning the Specific Application of Law in the Trial of National Defense Patent Disputes 关于审理国防专利纠纷案件具体应用法律若干问题的规定 (New Project)

Organizers: Civil Adjudication Tribunal No.3, Intellectual Property Court 

  1. Interpretation of Several Issues concerning the Application of Punitive Compensation for Intellectual Property Infringement 关于知识产权侵权惩罚性赔偿适用法律若干问题的解释

Organizers: Civil Adjudication Tribunal No.3, Intellectual Property Court  

  1. Interpretation of Several Issues concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Civil Cases Involving Unfair Competition 关于审理不正当竞争民事案件适用法律若干问题的解释 (New Project)

Organizers: Civil Adjudication Tribunal No.3, Intellectual Property Court 

  1. Provisions on Legal Issues concerning the Specific Application of Law in the Trial of New Plant Variety Right Infringement Cases 关于审理植物新品种权纠纷案件具体适用法律问题的规定 (New Project)

Organizers: Intellectual Property Court, Civil Adjudication Tribunal No.3

 Judicial interpretations that are not marked as the “New Projects” have already been on the SPC’s Judicial Interpretation Agenda for 2019 or 2018. Several of them, including Several Provisions on Evidence in Civil Procedures of Intellectual Property (2019) and Interpretation of Several Issues concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Administrative Cases for Patent Authorization and Confirmation (2018 and 2019), were to have been completed by the end of 2019 or 2018. 

Class I Projects JI No. 37 and Class II Projects  Nos. 3 and 11 all have prior effective versions that were issued in 2012 or earlier.  It is likely that these “New Projects” will be in the form of amendments, perhaps significant, to the previous JI’s.

 

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Wang Binying and the Opportunity within the WIPO Crisis

The vote for WIPO Director General will be made in early March.  The Chinese candidate, Madame Wang Binying, is known to many in the foreign IP community in China, IP diplomats, and others.  She is currently a Deputy Director General at WIPO and is consider a front-runner for the position. Ms. Wang’s candidacy has elicited considerable opposition from many in the United States,  much of it ill-informed, but some of it raising legitimate concerns.  The Chinese media has responded in kind and accused the US of “bullying.”

Over a month ago, a bipartisan group of four U.S. senators had written to President Trump to request that the United States oppose Ms. Wang’s candidacy.  Wang’s name was put forth by China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs in November.  These senators have noted that “ Given China’s persistent violations of intellectual property protections, including through trade secret theft, corporate espionage, and forced transfer of technology, the United States and its allies must stand firmly against such a move.”

Other commentators have joined in the criticism, including Daniel Runde at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who recently co-authored an article, “Why the United States Should Care about the WIPO Election,” and  James Pooley, a former U.S. Deputy Director General at WIPO, is quoted in Foreign Policy as asking with regard to Ms. Wang, “[w]hy would you put the fox in charge of the [IP] hen house?”   I was also misquoted in the South China Morning Post as opposing Wang Binying on similar grounds.  For me, Ms. Wang’s candidacy is clouded – but not precluded – by the long shadow cast by Francis Gurry on WIPO’s relationship with China, not by any necessary risk of “IP theft”, which is a term I abjure.  I will discuss that issue later in this blog.

 

One concern is easily dismissed: Ms. Wang is eminently technically qualified to lead WIPO, as even some of her harshest critics note.  DDG Wang has excellent credentials. She has an LLM from the institution, where I teach (UC Berkeley, (1985-86), and  also obtained a certificate in commercial law from my own alma mater, Columbia Law School.  She also worked at the former State Administration for Industry and Commerce.  She has had a long-term tenure in senior positions at WIPO.  She even spent some time training at USPTO early in her career, upon the recommendation of a U.S. Foreign Commercial Service Officer, Clark T. Randt, III, who later served as U.S. Ambassador to China and who has known her for years.  In fact, my introduction to Ms. Wang occurred through Ambassador Randt when I served as IP Attaché to the U.S. Embassy in Beijing (2004-2008).

Another matter that should be cleared up is that she was somehow appointed by the Communist Party, as suggested by one journal.  The recommendation for Ms. Wang comes, appropriately, from China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.  It is  true, however, as the Washington Post has reported, that Ms. Wang’s appointment is part of a larger effort by China to assume leadership roles in a number of UN organizations and that most of these officials are likely Party members.  Moreover, U.S. diplomacy in this area is also hampered, as the Post has noted, “by the administration’s public contempt for the multilateralism and its damaged relationships with allies.”

As in every critique of things Chinese, there are also some ardent U.S. defenders.  Some U.S. patent lawyers have suggested to me that the U.S. doesn’t have a basis to criticize Wang or China because China has been strengthening  China’s patent system at the same time as the U.S. has been weakening its own IP regime.  While I am supportive of this observation, I believe it is irrelevant to Ms. Wang’s candidacy.  Different countries necessarily have different strengths and weaknesses in their IP regimes.  The WIPO position does not mandate international conformity with the nationality of its DG, even if that might be welcomed in some circumstances.  More importantly,  US patent practitioners should instead be primarily concerned whether WIPO will be handling international (PCT) patent applications in an expeditious and professional manner.  A second concern may be whether WIPO will embrace intellectual property norms consistent with U.S. policy in its role as the administrator of 26 separate treaties on intellectual property and as an organizer of conferences and training programs on intellectual property issues.

In contrast to the above, the serious  opposition to Ms. Wang generally breaks down into three related areas: (a)  Ms. Wang is a China-promoted official at a time of heightened U.S. concern over China’s support for “IP Theft”; (b) a China DG may be inclined to mishandle PCT applications or mismanage WIPO utilizing the extensive discretion afforded to her; and (c) WIPO’s policies in China are in need of  a change.  I discuss these below:

IP Theft

The United States government has long conflated a range of issues into “IP theft”, including cybersecurity, trade secret infringement, forced technology transfer, and restrictive market access policies.  Many of these policy issues are not within the domain of WIPO and therefore have a limited role in the discussion around Wang Binying.  Some of them are the subject of an ongoing WTO dispute involving forced technology transfer.  WIPO is primarily concerned with the more mundane tasks of filing international applications for patents, trademarks and designs, arbitrating IP disputes, and training on IP issues, and negotiation of new IP treaties.  Although IP enforcement and trade secrets are part of WIPO’s mandate, they occupy a very small policy-oriented role.

The reason there is a WTO case dealing with IP theft is simply that there are no WIPO cases.  WIPO, unlike the WTO,  is relatively toothless.  It cannot impose compensatory sanctions.  There is also no WIPO-administered treaty devoted to trade secret matters.  The U.S., which has been aggressively advocating for better international protection of trade secrets for several years, has successfully raised standards for trade secret protections outside of the WIPO treaty process, through free trade agreements and bilateral agreements, including the recent Phase 1 Agreement with China.  The major international agreement with the most teeth is the TRIPS Agreement (Article 39), which is administered by the WTO.  It obligates “Members” to “protect undisclosed information.” This affirmative obligation might, for example, support a WTO complaint against state-sponsored economic espionage or cyber-intrusions, among other acts.  Concerns about Ms. Wang aggressively pushing back on the U.S. IP theft policy agenda therefor seem badly misplaced.

A more significant concern than WIPO’s policy function is WIPO management.  The lion’s share of WIPO’s budget is derived from international IP filings, with Patent Cooperation Treaty Fees accounting for 75% of these receipts, followed by trademark fees, contributions, and design fees.  However, WIPO does not appear to have the same level of user accountability that other IP offices have.  For this reason, patent practitioners who actively used the WIPO system should be most concerned about how that system will be managed by a new DG, then with WIPO’s approach to “IP theft.”

PCT Applications and the Extensive Discretion Afforded by the WIPO DG

The record of the incumbent Director General, Francis Gurry, may serve as a useful guide to how much risk Wang Binying might present to US interests in WIPO’s administration of international patent applications through the Patent Cooperation Treaty.   James Pooley, a former WIPO Deputy Director General in charge of the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) process,  testified before the House Foreign Relations Committee in 2016, where he outlined these risks:

“The agency, in my opinion, is run by a single person who is not accountable for his behavior. He is able to rule as he does only with the tacit cooperation of member countries who are supposed to act as WIPO’s board of directors. And he is ultimately protected by an anachronistic shield of diplomatic immunity…

During my tenure I witnessed how a lack of any effective oversight frequently led to reckless decisions, often reflecting a disregard for the legitimate interests of the U.S. There are many examples I could provide, but here I will focus on three: his gift of high-end computer equipment to North Korea, his secret agreements with Russia and China to open satellite WIPO offices, and his relentless retaliation against whistleblowers who dared to come forward with the truth.”

Mr. Pooley’s concerns about the integrity of WIPO internal controls should be treated seriously, as the PCT system, which Mr. Pooley managed, contains a wealth of technical information that is confidential.  China or another malevolent actor, through a compliant DG, might access the secure WIPO computer systems for inappropriate purposes.   The  PCT, which is administered by WIPO, allows inventors to file one application and then wait 30 months before choosing the countries where they need a patent. It is particularly vulnerable during the time frame before the patent is published (18 months after the application date_  During this period before publication, the application is a secret and should not be disclosed to the public and is therefore vulnerable to misappropriation.

The risk of misappropriation of patented information by China under a Wang Binying leadership is hard to quantify; however, it remains incumbent upon WIPO to insure the integrity of its systems in order for the PCT system to remain viable.   These risks have historically been especially acute with respect to China.  China has a weak record of addressing bad faith use of its patent and trademark systems.  There is no concept of “fraud before the patent office,” or a sanctionable “duty of candor.”  China’s past record of legalizing the use of overseas patent materials to support domestic patent applications provides scant comfort.  As late as 2008, China permitted the filing of applications on patents based on disclosures by others in overseas markets, provided they had not been published anywhere in the world, or made known or marketed in China. Design patents merely required that the patented design is not marketed in China  (2000 Patent Law, Arts. 22, 23).   This loophole led to a phenomenon known as “patent hijacking” and would typically occur at an overseas trade show where a new product was displayed before its public disclosure or marketing to China.  A Chinese visitor might photograph a new product at an overseas trade show, email a photograph to his home office, and the home office would then rush to the Chinese patent office to file a design patent application, lawfully claiming it as his or her invention.  The Chinese patent system provided incentives to “steal” others’ proprietary information.  In addition to this form of legalized technology misappropriation, the U.S. government has accused Chinese agencies of covertly compelling the transfer of technology from foreign investors, an issue that has recently been addressed by the enactment of China’s Foreign Investment Law.

China also permits the anonymous filing of patent applications, which can further obscure whether an applicant obtained technical information from an illegitimate source (Examination Guidelines 4.1.2). In fact, one U.S. professor, Percival Zhang, was identified as possibly usurping such information and filing a patent application in China anonymously.  Mr. Zhang’s activities are discussed in a federal civil court case brought by the alleged actual inventor.  He was later convicted in a federal court, apparently on other charges.

The civil court case also involved a PCT application, where a Chinese entity was accused of misappropriating confidential information in advance and applying for a patent in its own name.  As the court noted:

“In September 2016, …  Bonumose filed an international patent application regarding tagatose, listing China as a covered country. The application remained confidential until April 2017. But Bonumose learned soon thereafter that the Tianjin Institute had filed its own patent application in November 2016. Tianjin’s application listed several inventors, two of whom asked to have an “unlisted name,” which is an unusual practice. Bonumose believes that the unnamed inventors are Zhang and a former Cell-Free employee. It further believes that there was no way the Tianjin application—which substantially mirrored Bonumose’s confidential application—could have been developed without knowledge and use of the tagatose trade secrets.

The theory of Bonumose’s case is therefore that Zhang,…  shared the tagatose trade secrets with the Tianjin Institute prior to the Tianjin application’s publication in November 2016. Indeed, Bonumose alleges that the Tianjin Institute paid Zhang and Cell-Free in exchange for the trade secrets. Bonumose is litigating five claims against Zhang and Cell-Free: two breach of contract claims; two trade secret claims (one federal and one state); and a declaratory judgment claim to ascertain the parties’ rights …”

These past activities do not mean that Ms. Wang would necessarily condone such activities nor that prior activities continue at the same level as they have in the past.  However, it does suggest that these concerns should be addressed by WIPO or any new DG in his or her interactions with China.

Continuation of WIPO’s policies in China and the need for change

U.S. concerns about WIPO’s potential misuse of confidential information are further magnified by accusations regarding the relationship that the current DG, Francis Gurry, has enjoyed with China. I quote Mr. Pooley again:

“Mr. Gurry had negotiated secret agreements with both China and Russia, which were first announced not by WIPO but by the China Daily News and The Voice of Russia, respectively. I remember very well going to lunch with one of my senior colleagues, when he surprised me with the news of the Moscow office, while I was the one to first inform him about the Beijing office. These secretive deals provoked a storm of controversy among the member states of WIPO, and as a result at their annual meeting in October 2013 they could not agree on a budget for the organization.”

U.S. suspicions regarding Gurry’s relationship with China are magnified by his frequent travels to China and his high-level meetings with the Chinese government. Of course, there is nothing wrong with high-level Chinese government meetings, as China is an active user of the PCT and other WIPO facilities.  Of concern to me is that Gurry underscores in almost all his China interviews the importance of strong government management of IP, via, inter alia,  “repeated messaging from the leadership of the importance of intellectual property.”  In one interview Gurry noted that China’s IP system has evolved so quickly due to the central direction given to China’s IP system, and praised China’s successful “planned, systemic and leadership-driven system.”  Similarly, in a November 2019 interview, Gurry noted that  China’s development in intellectual property has been “outstanding” and underscored the “focus and support of the leadership.”  The interviewer, Tian Wei, by contrast, noted that “the top-down approach is of course sometimes something quite unique to China.”  Gurry’s support of top-down approaches to IP also extended to his Global Innovation Index, which accords considerable weight to raw numbers invention and utility model patent filings as an indicator of innovative capacity.  This approach tends to naturally favor metric-driven IP regimes.

My interview with the South China Morning Post, noted above, was in fact directed to this embrace of state-driven innovation by Gurry.  As I noted in the interview “If Wang steps into those [Gurry’s] shoes, 10 years from now we will no longer have an IP system based on markets.”   This blog has consistently advocated that, despite the many strengths of China’s IP regime, the main defect of China’s IP regime is the inadequate focus afforded to IP as a private property right and that an overemphasis on the “socialist” aspects of China’s developing market economy could be antithetical to such a private property rights orientation.  I have not only criticized Chinese efforts which might weaken a private property rights orientation, but also the efforts of other authorities, including the US and  WIPO, which support greater Chinese intervention in its markets.  Gurry has consistently ignored that a “planned, systemic and leadership-driven system” can easily deviate from the commitment China made at WTO accession in acceding to the TRIPS Agreement that “intellectual property is a private right”  [emphasis supplied] (TRIPS Preamble).

Would a DG Wang be different from DG Gurry? I have known DDG Wang Binying since my tenure at IP Attaché at the US Embassy in Beijing (2004-2008). She also enjoys cordial relations with many prominent and active U.S. IP lawyers and officials.  Indeed, several foreigners I spoke with thought that she should be given a chance to break out from the legacy of Francis Gurry and, given her expertise, could do an excellent job.  Much as Tian Wei noted in her interview that Gurry’s perspective on China’s IP regime is not consistent with some of China’s own criticisms of its regime, it would not be unusual to expect that Wang Binying may have a better understanding of the needs of her country than Francis Gurry.  In this respect, Francis Gurry may have done a disservice to China, the US and Ms. Wang.

I note with regret that Francis Gurry’s legacy also goes deeper than perspectives on the role of the state in China’s IP regime.  During my tenure at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing and later at the USPTO on its China team (from 2004-2008, and 2012-2017), I was never invited to a WIPO-sponsored symposium in China.  In fact, I  was disinvited to one symposium when a Chinese sponsor affiliated with a WIPO program noted with surprise that an American was being invited to speak at a WIPO event in China.

The data on WIPO’s website further confirms the strongly China-oriented focus of the China office’s activities in China.  The online listing of programs of WIPO’s Beijing office fails to list any multinational program or a program with a foreign government. By contrast, the Singapore office holds regional and national programs, and Brazil’s office is engaged in South-South cooperation as well as hosting international events.  WIPO’s HQ has hosted multinational events in China as well, such as a recent judicial program, often with US participation.  I polled several diplomats who have resided in China prior to writing this blog.  Although there appear to have been some positive recent developments, their past experience of being denied opportunities to participate in WIPO programs was consistent with mine.   Would a DG Wang carry forward this nationalist orientation of China’s WIPO activities?

Conclusion

I believe that active management controls, oversight and perhaps structural reform can help address the risk of trade secret leakage and other management risks from WIPO.  I also believe that, if elected, Wang Binying might be able to leave the unhealthy legacy of Francis Gurry in China behind, and indeed could help improve relations with the United States by adopting a more collaborative and balanced approach.  Although she had been closely associated with DG Gurry, I know of no direct accusation against her with regard to any of the risks noted above.  However, the lack of any such accusation is not proof that the risks aren’t real, nor does it mean that U.S. concerns need not be addressed.  For the United States, these concerns generally also do not exist with respect to candidates from outside of China.   Indeed, whatever the success of her candidacy, it would be helpful for WIPO, its member states, and Ms. Wang herself to step out of the shadows and address those legitimate concerns raised by the United States and others.

If these concerns are properly addressed, both WIPO and U.S.-China IP relations can only be strengthened, and a DG Wang, if elected, would be off to a very good start.  As any student of modern Chinese knows, the Chinese term for crisis 危机 contains the character for opportunity 机会.  Wang Binying’s candidacy can present such an opportunity.

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The Phase 1 IP Agreement: Its Fans and Discontents

How much will the IP Sections of the Phase 1 Agreement (the “Agreement”) with China change  IP strategies in China?   For the most part, the Agreement adds much less than its appearance might suggest.  Many of the important changes that the Agreement memorializes have recently been codified into law or set into motion for forthcoming codification.  There are some important prospective changes in the text, particularly regarding pharmaceutical patent protections and in civil and criminal enforcement.  If these changes are well-implemented, that could augur significant changes in the future.  Nonetheless, a cautious approach should be taken to these changes as well, as many of them have a long history of disappointing US rightsholders.  An additional problem with the Agreement is its reliance on administrative mechanisms that have a track record of not providing sustained protection for IP rights.

The IP-related sections are found in Chapter 1 of the Agreement (“Intellectual Property”) and Chapter 2 (“Technology Transfer”).  Chapter 1 is divided into the following sections: General Obligations, Trade Secrets and Confidential Information, Pharmaceutical-Related Intellectual Property, Patents, Piracy and Counterfeiting on E-Commerce Platforms, Geographical Indications, Manufacture and Export of Pirated and Counterfeit Goods, Bad-Faith Trademarks, Judicial Enforcement and Procedure in Intellectual Property Cases, and Bilateral Cooperation on Intellectual Property Protection. Chapter 2 concerns Technology Transfer and is not divided into separate sections.

There are many concerning textual aspects of the Agreement.  For example, it is unclear why “Technology Transfer” was not considered an IP issue in the Agreement.  Additional ambiguities are supplied by inconsistent use of legal language as well as differences in the English and Chinese texts, both of which are understood to be equally valid (Art. 8.6).  A careful reading shows that in many cases the Agreement does not afford any new progress on particular issues, but merely serves as a placeholder on issues that have long been under active discussion (e.g., on post-filing supplementation of pharmaceutical data in patent applications).  There are also several provisions that appear to break new ground, such as in consularization of court documents by foreigners and enforcement of civil judgments.

Reactions from the dozens of people I spoke with about the Agreement in the US and China have been mixed.   One prominent Chinese attorney thought that Chinese IP enforcement officials were now much more likely to be responsive to US requests in forthcoming enforcement proceedings.  Several individuals thought that the Agreement would be a great stimulus to IP agencies and the courts in their enforcement efforts as well as in drafting new laws, regulations and judicial interpretations.  Many academics were perplexed by the unclear language in the Agreement.  Some experts shared my view that the Agreement places an undue emphasis on the wrong issues, such as punitive damages, administrative campaigns, and criminal punishment at the expense of compensatory civil compensation.  Due to the numerous errors and inconsistencies in the Agreement, many people speculated that the negotiators on the US side and/or the Chinese side may not have been adequately consulting with experts, bringing to mind the Chinese expression of “building a chariot while the door is closed (without consulting others)” (闭门造车）.  The administrative and Customs enforcement provisions were dismissed by many as out of date or just for show.  On the other hand, it did appear that the Chinese negotiators did rely upon their interagency experts.  Susan Finder, the author of the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) Monitor, told me that the SPC (and likely the Supreme People’s Procuratorate [SPP]) provided input to the Chinese negotiating team.

Review of the Individual Sections and Articles

The trade secret provisions generally memorialize amendments already made to China’s Anti-Unfair Competition Law, including an expanded scope of definition of “operator” (Art. 1.3), acts that constitute trade secret infringement (Art. 1.4), as well as a shifting of burden of proof in civil proceedings where there is a reasonable basis to conclude that a trade secret infringement has occurred (Art. 1.5).  Interestingly, the United States asserts in this section that it provides treatment equivalent to such shifting of a burden of proof.  I am unaware of any nationwide burden-shifting in US civil trade secret proceedings, except – as a stretch – insofar as US discovery proceedings provide an opportunity to compel production of evidence from an adverse party.  This view was also shared by others I had spoken to.

The trade secret provisions also require China to provide for preliminary injunctions in trade secret cases where there is an “urgent situation”.   The use of preliminary injunctions to address early-stage trade secret theft has long been under discussion between the US and China.  This is an awkward hybrid of Chinese and English legal standards.   Generally the test in Chinese law for “action preservation”  as in US law for “preliminary injunctions” is whether there is irreparable injury arising from such urgent situation which necessitates provisional relief (See Sec. 101 of Civil Procedure Law)  An “urgent” situation which is not likely to cause irreparable injury does not require granting of a preliminary injunction.   China’s judicial practice currently permits the use of preliminary injunctions where there is a risk of disclosure of confidential information (关于审查知识产权纠纷行为保全案件适用法律若干问题的规定, Art. 6.1).  It appears likely that the current test for preliminary injunctions are unaffected by this provision, and the provision just memorializes current Chinese law –  notwithstanding that is unclear about the standards and scope of action preservation procedures in China

The Agreement also uses inconsistent nomenclature to describe preliminary injunctions.  As noted, the Chinese text does not refer to preliminary injunctions but refers to an overlapping concept of “action preservation.” Other provisions of the English language text of the Agreement discuss “preliminary injunctions or equivalent effective provisional measures” (Art. 1-11).

Historically, Chinese judges have been highly reluctant to issue preliminary injunctions.  As Susan Finder has noted in an email to me, the language in the Agreement also does not address the underlying structural problem that judges may be reluctant to give injunctions because they are concerned they will be found to have incorrectly issued them, and hence held accountable under the judicial responsibility system.  The Agreement also does not account for the fact that provisional measures serve a different function in the Chinese system compared to the United States.  China concludes its court cases far more quickly than the United States, thereby providing more immediate relief, often without needing recourse to provisional measures if there is not an urgent need.

The Agreement also requires China to change its trade secret thresholds for “initiating criminal enforcement.” (Art. 1.7).   The Agreement does not specify what measures are to be reformed, such as the Criminal Law or Judicial Interpretations,  or standards for initiating criminal investigations by public security organs and/or the procuracy and State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) administrative enforcement agencies (See, e.g., 关于公安机关管辖的刑事案件立案追诉标准的规定（二)).  The issue of what constitutes “great loss” for calculating criminal thresholds has itself been the subject of discussion and changing standards over the years.

As mentioned in Susan Finder’s November 26, 2019, blogpost, a judicial interpretation on trade secrets is on the SPC’s judicial interpretation agenda for 2020, scheduled for issuance in the first half of the year.  Additional guidance may be expected from the procuratorate, SAMR, and Ministry of Public Security to address criminal enforcement issues.

Consistent with the Foreign Investment Law, the Agreement also prohibits government authorities from disclosing confidential business information (Art. 1.9).

The Pharmaceutical-Related Intellectual Property section of the Agreement requires China to adopt a patent linkage system, much as was originally contemplated in the CFDA Bulletin 55, but subsequently did not appear in the proposed patent law revisions of late 2018. Linkage will be granted to an innovator on the basis that a  (a) company has a confidential regulatory data package on file with China’s regulatory authorities,  and (b) where a third party, such as a generic pharmaceutical company, seeks to rely upon safety and efficacy information of the innovator.  The drafters seem to be describing a situation similar to an Abbreviated New Drug Application (ANDA) in the United States under the US Hatch-Waxman regime.  According to US procedures, a generic company needs to demonstrate, inter alia, bioequivalent safety and efficacy to an innovator’s pharmaceutical product in order to obtain regulatory approval.  Notice is thereafter provided to the patent holder or its licensee of the application for regulatory approval to address the possibility that the generic company may be infringing the innovator’s patent(s).

This linkage regime, if properly implemented, with be an important step for Chian’s struggling innovative pharmaceutical sector.  China’s proposed linkage regime also extends to biologics (Art 1.11).  Taiwan has also recently introduced a linkage regime.

In order to implement the linkage regime, the Agreement requires an administrative or judicial process for an innovator to challenge a generic company’s market entry based on the generic company’s infringement of a patent held by the innovator  As drafted, the Agreement omits a requirement to amend China’s patent law or civil procedure law to permit a court to act when there is an “artificial infringement” by reason of approval of an infringing product for regulatory approval, notwithstanding the lack of any infringing manufacturing, use or sale of the product prior to its introduction into commerce in China. The lack of a concept of “artificial infringement” could make it especially difficult to implement a civil linkage regime in China.  The US Chamber of Commerce and the Beijing Intellectual Property Institute (BIPI) had previously recommended revising Article 11 of China’s patent law to address this issue.  BIPI had noted in its report that “Lacking of artificial infringement provisions results in lacking [sic] of legal grounds for the brand drug company to safeguard their legal rights.” This provision likely reflects continuing turf battles between the courts and China’s administrative IP agencies in enforcing IP rights.  Implementation of a linkage regime by China’s National Medical Products Administration (NMPA) may be possible in the alternative, as a matter of its regulation of pharmaceutical products, however, there may be concerns that NMPA lacks the necessary expertise and independence to properly adjudicate pharmaceutical patent disputes.

The Agreement also does not reference regulatory data protection, which was one of China’s WTO obligations, nor does it reference China’s efforts to adopt an ‘orange book’ similar to the US FDA’s to govern patent disclosures and regulatory data protection as recommended by CFDA Bulletin 55.  This section also reiterates in general terms a commitment by China to provide for post-filing supplementation of data in pharmaceutical patent matters, which has been a long-standing request of the US reflected in several JCCT commitments.  Permitting post-filing supplementation is necessary to support a linkage regime.  In the absence of any meaningful patent grants, China’s patent linkage commitments would be a hollow outcome.

The  Patent section continues the focus on pharmaceutical IP by providing for patent term extension due to regulatory delays for pharmaceutical patents, including patented methods of making and using pharmaceutical products (Art. 1.12).  The draft patent law already provides for patent term extension.  The additional encouragement is welcome.

There are no provisions in this Agreement addressing non-pharmaceutical patent concerns.   Companies that may have concerns about such issues as:  standards-essential patent prosecution or litigation, low-quality patents, patent trolls, procedures involving civil or administrative litigation involving patents or Customs enforcement of patents, China’s increasing interest in litigating global patent disputes for standards-essential patents, the relationship between industrial policy and patent grants, expanding the scope of design patent protection, China’s amending its plant variety protection regime and acceding to the most recent treaty obligations, etc.,  will find that their issues are not addressed.

Section E on “Piracy and Counterfeiting on E-Commerce Platforms” addresses “enforcement against e-commerce platforms”.  By its terms, it does not specifically discuss e-tailers, online service providers or other third parties.

The text (Art. 1.13) seeks to clarify and update the E-Commerce Law by “eliminat[ing] liability for erroneous takedown notices submitted [presumably by rightsholders] in good faith,”  extending mandating a time period of 20 days for rightsholders to file an administrative or judicial response to a counter-notification, and penalizing counter-notifications taken in bad faith.  Joe Simone (SIPS) has told me this Article’s 20 day period may require an amendment to the E-Commerce law, which currently requires a 10 day period.

Article 1.14 specifically addresses infringement on “major” e-commerce platforms. As part of this commitment, China also agreed to revoke the operating licenses of e-commerce platforms that repeatedly fail to curb the sale of counterfeit and pirated goods.  It is unclear from this text if this provision is limited to “major” platforms as the title suggests (in both English and Chinese), or to platforms of any size as the Article itself states.  In addition, it is unclear what kind of “operating license” is involved auch as a general business license or a license to operate an internet business.  Whatever license is involved, this remedy has theoretically been available for some time for companies that sell infringing goods.  As I recall, past efforts to use license revocations to address IP infringement had little success.  Smaller enterprises might be able to circumvent the license revocation, perhaps by transferring businesses to another platform  In the past, companies also evaded enforcement obligations by establishing a new business incorporated or operated under their name or that of a relative or friend.  This provision, similar to other IP provisions of the Agreement, rehashes earlier JCCT commitments with apparent disregard to lessons previously learned or developments in Chinese law and its economy.

Article 1.14  notes, unlike other Articles which note that the United States has equivalent procedures, tellingly states that the United States “is studying additional means to combat the sale of counterfeit or pirated goods.”  According to news reports, the USTR has threatened to place Amazon on the  list of “notorious markets.” Since the publication of the Agreement, Peter Navarro at the White House has also threatened to crack down on US platforms due to the increased pressure of the trade deal to “combat the prevalence of counterfeit or pirated goods on e-commerce platforms.”

The Geographical Indications (GI) Section (F) continues long-standing US engagement with China with respect to its GI system.   The Agreement requires that multi-component terms that contain a generic term will not be protected as a GI, consistent with prior bilateral commitments.  China will also share proposed lists of GI’s it exchanges with other trading partners with the US to help ensure that generic terms are not protected as GI’s.  The competing GI systems of the United States and China have been the subject of decades of diplomacy.  This Section arguably is intended primarily to show political support for American companies that manufacture or distribute generic food and other products that compete with GI-intensive products such as wine and cheese.  It is also likely intended to support US advocacy around these issues at the WTO, WIPO and bilaterally.

Section G requires China to act against counterfeit pharmaceuticals and related products, including active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) and bulk chemicals (Art. 1.18).  It is unclear if these APIs need to be counterfeited to be seized, or if they should be liable for seizure because they are low quality or contribute to the manufacturing of counterfeit goods.  The issue of API’s and bulk chemicals contributing to the production of counterfeit medicine has long been a discussion point between the US and China and had been the subject of JCCT outcomes.  Providing API’s to counterfeiters is already a crime and civil violation.  It can also give rise to administrative liability, although administrative agencies have often not prioritized contributory liability.  Thanks to Joe Simone again, for providing me with the benefit of his experiences in this area.

China is also required to act against “Counterfeit Goods with Health and Safety Risks” (Art. 1.19).  The text does not explicitly address unsafe products that do not bear a counterfeit trademark or the enforcement agencies that will implement this commitment.  Generally, the burden of enforcing against counterfeit products belongs to trademark enforcers, rather than enforcement officials involved in product quality or consumer protection violations.  However, the NMPA and/or the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology are specifically named as enforcement agencies in a related provision to this one (Art. 1.18).

This section also seeks to address “Manufacture and Export” of these goods, including “block[ing]” their distribution (chapeau language).  It does not elaborate on how such cross-border steps will be undertaken – such as by Customs agents, law enforcement authorities, cooperation between food and drug regulatory agencies, or through bilateral or multilateral law enforcement cooperation.

The failure to clearly designate a responsible agency in these administrative and law enforcement commitments can lead to problems with enforcing IP rights.  The academic literature, including that of Prof. Martin Dimitrov,  has suggested that when multiple agencies have unclear and overlapping IP enforcement authority, they may be more inclined to shirk responsibility.  I hope that coordination mechanisms for these and other outcomes have been well-negotiated to address this issue.

Article 1.20 addresses the destruction of counterfeit goods by Customs, in civil judicial proceedings and in criminal proceedings.  Article 1-20(1) requires Customs to not permit the exportation of counterfeit or pirated goods  Due to the growth of e-commerce and B2C exports from China via online platforms, container-sized seizures have become rarer, and the practical consequences of this provision may be limited.  Moreover, rightsholders have not often complained of Customs’ destruction procedures.  A WTO case brought by the United States involving Chinese customs destruction procedures also failed to identify losses to the United States by reason of China’s not disposing of seized goods outside of the channels of commerce consistent with its WTO obligations to seize goods on import  (DS362) (see 0% auctioned on imports, below).  At that time, when containerized shipment seizure was more common, only 3.7% of imported and exported goods were auctioned by value and 1.9% by shipments.   7.351ds362

My former colleague, Tim Trainer,  has identified what is new in the Agreement in Customs as seizures in transit.

The Article does not define what is a “counterfeit” good, or whether manufacturing a product for export may constitute an infringement of the rights of a third party that holds the right in China, which is the so-called OEM problem.  In a typical OEM scenario, the importer in a foreign country owns the relevant rights in the importing country, but not in China.

Article 1.20(2)(d) requires the courts to order that a rightsholder be compensated for injury from infringement in civil judicial procedures, presumably when goods are seized.  It is unclear to me why the Agreement does not address the critical issue of affording adequate civil damages generally, why it is limited to the Customs context, and why the Agreement does not generally address the overuse of low statutory damages in IP-related civil disputes generally.

The Agreement requires that materials and implements which are “predominantly” used in the creation of counterfeit and pirated goods shall be forfeited and destroyed.  This “predominant use” test is derived from the TRIPS agreement. It regrettably provides a basis for goods that are demonstrated to have a less than dominant use (e.g.,  49.9 percent) to avoid forfeiture and destruction.   A better test might have been to encourage China to use a “substantial use” test, or a test based simply on use in commercial-scale counterfeiting and piracy.  IP owners may wish to consider using judicial asset preservation measures by the courts in order to address issues involving the seizure of goods that are also used for legitimate manufacturing purposes.

Destruction of counterfeit goods by Market Supervision Bureaus in administrative trademark enforcement proceedings is not discussed in this Agreement and has been an area of concern by rightsholders in the past.  This omission is concerning as China’s administrative enforcement of trademarks has historically been a highly active area of IP enforcement on behalf of foreign rightsholders.

Section H addresses the bad-faith registration of trademarks.  No specific action is required by China in the text.  I have previously discussed the importance of expanding concepts of “good faith” in IP protection in China with hopes that it would be addressed in resolving the trade war and had specifically noted two issues addressed in the Agreement: bad-faith registration of trademarks, and ensuring that employees were covered objects of China’s trade secret law.  Certain steps have already been undertaken by relevant agencies to address the important issue of bad faith trademark registrations, including:  supporting oppositions/invalidation against marks filed in bad faith and with no intention to use (Article 4 of the Trademark Law);  addressing the problem of trademark agencies that knowingly facilitate those bad faith trademark filings under Article 4, and imposing administrative fines against bad faith trademark applicants for a purpose other than use or judicial punishments against pirates that bring trademark infringement lawsuits against brand owners victimized by bad-faith registrations.

Given the lack of identified concrete next steps in this important area, China may not be planning to do little more legislation in this area in the near future, and/or waiting to better evaluate the impact of recently implemented measures and policies, including provisions allowing fines to be imposed against trademark pirates. Joe Simone has suggested that one helpful measure to consider in the future might be for courts to award compensation for legal and investigation fees in bad faith cases, ideally by the same courts handling invalidation and opposition appeals.

Section I requires the transfer of cases from administrative authorities to “criminal authorities” when there is a “reasonable suspicion based on articulable facts” that a criminal violation has occurred.  “Criminal authorities” are not defined.  This could include the Ministry of Public Security and/or the Procuracy. The intent behind this provision is likely to ensure more deterrent penalties for IP violations and avoid the use of administrative penalties as a safe harbor to insulate against criminal enforcement.  This problem of low administrative referrals is an old and thorny one.  In bilateral discussions of the last decade, we would often inquire about the “administrative referral rate” of China, which is the percentage of administrative IP cases that were referred to criminal prosecution, which has historically been quite low. See National Trade Estimates Report (2009) at pp. 101-102.  However, if administrative agencies are required to transfer cases to the Public Security Bureau or Procuratorate, it will have little impact unless these agencies accept the case and initiate prosecutions.  A loophole in this text may be that it does not mandate that a case is accepted after it has been referred by administrative agencies, thereby risking non-action by prosecutors.  As administrative agencies have more limited investigative powers, the evidence provided by administrative authorities may also often be insufficient to initiate a criminal investigation.

Article 1.27 requires China to establish civil remedies and criminal penalties to “deter” future intellectual property theft or infringements.  These requirements are also found in the TRIPS Agreement.  The English language text of the Agreement conflates the role of civil remedies and criminal penalties and their deterrent impact.   Civil remedies should, at a minimum, deter or stop (制止，阻止） the defendant from repeating the infringing act, whereas criminal remedies might also provide broader social deterrence (威慑 as in nuclear “deterrence”, which is found in the Chinese version of the Agreement).  This paragraph and the Agreement more generally do not underscore the important role of compensatory civil damages in providing deterrence.

The Agreement also requires China to impose penalties at or near the maximum when a range of penalties is provided and to increase penalties over time.

These provisions regarding criminal enforcement generally reflect concerns articulated in the unsuccessful WTO IP case the US brought against China to lower its trademark and copyright criminal thresholds  (DS362).  However, the lost lesson from that case is that criminal thresholds are not as important as other factors in creating deterrence. Prosecutors may still decline in fact to prosecute cases, even if they are required by law to accept cases.  Law enforcement may also lack adequate resources. Judges may also have discretion in imposing sentences.  The calculation of the thresholds themselves, whether based on illegal income or harm caused, may be difficult to assess.  The civil system also needs to play a robust role in creating respect for IP.  The proof of the limited impact of lowering criminal thresholds is that criminal IP cases significantly increased in China after it lost the WTO case.  After the United States “lost” that WTO case, the number of criminal IPR cases rapidly increased to a high of approximately 13,000 in 2013.  Whether the Chinese data  of 2013 was calculated to include only IPR-specific crimes or crimes that may encompass IPR-infringing products (such as involving substandard products), this was a dramatic increase from approximately 2,684 criminal IP cases or 907 IPR infringement crimes from 2007.  The bottom line is that simply increasing criminal cases through lower thresholds may not be enough to create a healthy IP environment.

Another issue of concern is that foreigners have often been named as defendants in serious civil or criminal cases. The first significant criminal copyright case in China involved American defendants distributing counterfeit DVD’s.  More recently, patent preliminary injunction cases were granted in favor of two different Chinese entities in two cases against American defendants (Micron and Veeco). The largest patent damages case involved the first instance decision in Chint v. Schneider Electric (330 million RMB).  The NDRC investigation of Qualcomm similarly pioneered high antitrust damages in an IP licensing matter.  In many instances,  the final decisions in pioneering cases where foreigners lost were also never published.  Given this track record, we might not want to be advocating for harsher enforcement in the absence of greater commitments to due process and transparency.

The Agreement also pioneers by providing for expeditious enforcement of judgments (Article 1.28).  According to Susan Finder, the SPC already lists judgment debtors in its database.  This is a welcome area of engagement and should also be supported by continuing transparency in this area.

Over the past several years, there has been an increasing incidence of multijurisdictional IP disputes, particularly in technology sectors.  The Agreement does not address the problems arising from these cases.  It does not mention that China does not enforce US judgments, although the US has begun enforcing some Chinese money judgments, nor does it address the practice of many Chinese courts to fast track their decision making to undercut US cases.  Generally, US lawyers cannot conduct discovery in China and formal international procedures to collect evidence are slow.  Both Chinese and US courts often rarely apply foreign law, even when such law may be more appropriate to resolution of a dispute.  Based on a recent program I attended at Renmin University, it also appears likely that Chinese courts will issue their own anti-suit injunctions soon.  The Agreement also does not require anything further in terms of judicial assistance in gathering evidence.  These are areas for potential cooperation as well as confrontation.  Indeed Berkeley and Tsinghua have held a continuing series of conferences on this topic.  At the recent Renmin University conference, British, German, US and Chinese judges exchanged their views on these topics in a cordial and productive manner.  It is my hope that this topic is an area of collaboration, not confrontation.

Regarding copyright, Article 1.29 provides for a presumption of ownership in copyright cases and requires the accused infringer to demonstrate that its use of a work protected by copyright is authorized.  It would also have been helpful if the US and China had discussed the problem of title by title lawsuits in China, which has also increased costs of litigation through requiring multiple non-consolidated lawsuits for one collection of songs, photos or other works.  One Chinese academic confided in me that the current practice of requiring that each individual title be the subject of an individual lawsuit was not the original practice in China’s courts and that the old practice was more efficient for both the courts and rightsholders.

The Chinese and English texts of the Agreement also differ to the extent that the English text refers to the US system of related rights, while the Chinese next refers to the Chinese (and European system) of neighboring rights.

In terms of civil procedure, Article 1.30 permits the parties to introduce evidence through stipulation or witness testimony under penalty of perjury, as well as requiring streamlined notarization procedures for other evidence.  China’s ability to implement “penalty of perjury” submissions is limited by China generally lacking a concept of authenticating a document under penalty of perjury, which also hampers lawyer’s ability to represent clients by powers of attorney.  The implementation and impact of this provision is unclear.

Article 1.31 permits expert witness testimony.  Expert witnesses are already permitted under existing Chinese law, although the trend appears to favor greater use of them.  Moreover, Chinese courts have been expanding the role of expert technology assessors to provide support for technologically complex cases.  Once again the implementation and impact of this provision is uncertain, although we can expect further developments from the courts in this area, particularly in anticipated guidance concerning evidence in IP cases.

Article 1.35 requires that China adopt an action plan to implement the IP chapter of the Agreement.  In an additional welcome development, the Agreement also supports reinstatement of cooperative relationships with the USPTO, the USDOJ and US Customs.

Chapter 2 addresses US allegations regarding forced technology transfer.  It prohibits China from seeking technology transfer overseas consistent with its industrial plans subject to the qualifier that such plans  “create distortion.”  Distortion is not defined.

Other provisions prohibit require technology transfer as a condition of market access, using administration or licensing requirements to compel technology transfer and maintaining the confidentiality of sensitive technical information.   These are consistent with the recently enacted Foreign Investment Law and other legislation.

The Technology Transfer provisions do not address whether the provisions that were removed from the TIER  are now governed by China’s Contract Law and proposed Civil Code provisions on technology transfer contracts.  Clarity on this important issue could help support the autonomy of parties to freely negotiate ownership of improvements and indemnities.  The Agreement also does not address the regulation of licensing agreements by antitrust authorities or under China’s contract law or proposed civil code for the “monopolization” of technology.  The Civil Code provisions are now pending before the NPC and could have appropriately been raised as “low hanging fruit” in this Agreement.  Antitrust concerns in IP had also been raised by several parties in the 301 report concerning IP concerns (at pp. 180-181).  Hopefully, these issues will be decided in the Phase 2 Agreement.

Some additional hope for IP commercialization is afforded by the commitments by China in the Agreement to increase its purchases of services by $37.9 billion from the United States during the next two years, which include purchases of IP rights as well as business travel and tourism, financial services and insurance, other services and cloud and related services.  Considering the central role played by forced technology transfer in this trade war, it was to be hoped that a specific commitment on purchases of IP rights might have been secured.

Concluding Observations

It is often difficult to discern the problems that the Agreement purports to address and/or the appropriateness of the proposed solution(s).    In some instances, it also appears that USTR dusted off old requests to address long-standing concerns that may also not have high value due to technological and economic changes.   For example, it is unclear to me if commitments in the Agreement regarding end-user piracy (Art. 1.23) by the government are as necessary today when software is often delivered as an online cloud-based service and not as a commodity.  The leading software trade association’s position in the 301 investigation did not mention end-user piracy as a top-four priority (p. 4). Moreover, China had already been conducting software audits for several years and piracy rates had been declining.  The commercial value of these commitments is also uncertain under China’s recent “3-5-2 Directive”, where the Chinese government is obligated to replaced foreign software and IT products completely with domestic products within the next three years.  The Agreement already contains commitments for China to increase its share of cloud-based services.  The issue does have a long and sad history. The U.S. Government Accountability Office had calculated 22 different commitments on software piracy in bilateral JCCT and economic dialogues between 2004 and February 2014.

Among the more anachronous provisions of the Agreement are the five separate special administrative IP campaigns that the Agreement mandates.  The general consensus from a range of disciplines and enforcement areas (e.g., IP, counterfeit tobacco products, pollution, and taxation) that campaigns result in “short term improvements, but no lasting change.”  Moreover, the focus of these campaigns, including Customs enforcement and physical markets appears outdated due to the growth of e-commerce platforms.

The situation was predictable: “late-term administrations may … be tempted to condone campaign-style IP enforcement, which can generate impressive enforcement statistics but have limited deterrence or long-term sustainability.” The Administration took this one step further, with enforcement campaign reports timed to be released during the various stages of the Presidential campaign.   Here are some of the administrative campaign reports we can expect, with some corresponding milestones in the Presidential campaign season:

March 15: China is required to publish an Action Plan to strengthen IP protection and to report on measures taken to implement the Agreement and dates that new measures will go into effect. (Art. 1.35)

May 15: China is required to substantially increase its border and physical market enforcement actions and report on activities by Customs authorities within three months (or by April 15, 2020) (Art. 1.21).

May 15: China is required to report on enforcement activities against counterfeit goods that pose health or safety risks within four months and quarterly thereafter (Art. 1.19).

June 15: China is required to report on enforcement at physical markets within four months and quarterly thereafter (Art. 1.22).  This report will coincidentally be released at the same time as the Democratic Party Convention.

August 15: China is required to report on counterfeit medicine enforcement activity in six months and annually thereafter (Art.. 1.18).  This report will coincidentally be released approximately one week before the Republican Convention.

September 15: China is required to report on third party independent audits on the use of licensed software within seven months, and annually thereafter (Art. 1.23).

Also, a quarterly report is required regarding the enforcement of IP judgments (Art. 1.28).

There is no explanation provided in the Agreement for the timing of each of these reports, their sequential staging or why the usual date for release of government IP reports (April 26) is not being used.

There are many other important IP areas not addressed in the Agreement.  The Agreement offered a missed opportunity to support judicial reform, including China’s new national appellate IP court, the new internet courts as well as local specialized IP courts at the intermediate level.  The Agreement also entails no obligations to publish more trade secret cases, to make court dockets more available to the public, and to generally improve transparency in administrative or court cases, which might have made the Agreement more self-enforcing.  Due to the relatively small number of civil and criminal trade secret cases and recent legislative reforms, the greater publication of cases would be very helpful in assessing the challenges in litigating this area and China’s compliance with the Agreement. The new appellate IP Court will be especially critical to the effective implementation of the important changes in China’s trade secret law as well as the implementation of the patent linkage regime.  The patent linkage provision also similarly neglects to describe the critical role of the courts in an effective linkage regime.  The Agreement to a certain extent memorializes the ongoing tensions between administrative and civil enforcement in China and regrettably reemphasizes the role of the administrative agencies in managing IP through campaigns and punishment.

The trade war afforded a once in a lifetime opportunity to push for market mechanisms in managing IP assets through a reduced role for administrative agencies and improved civil remedies in China’s IP enforcement regime.   A high cost was paid in tariffs to help resolve a problem that the Administration estimated, or exaggerated, to be as high as 600 billion dollars.   The reforms in the Agreement hardly total up to addressing a problem of that magnitude, and in many cases appear more focused on yesterday’s problems.  While the continued emphasis on administrative agencies and limited focus on civil remedies is disappointing, there are nonetheless many notable IP  reforms in the Agreement in addition to legislative reforms already delivered.  I hope that a Phase 2 agreement will deliver additional positive changes that also address the challenges of the future

Please send me your insights, comments, criticisms or corrections!  Happy Spring Festival!

Please send in any comments or corrections!

Revised 1/23/2020, 1/27/2020

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The Trump Administration and China IP Diplomacy: Old Wine In a New Bottle?

Two major China IP events occurred in late November and December. One of them was the long-awaited first phase of a settlement of the US-China trade war.  The second was the nomination of Wang Binying to replace Francis Gurry as Director-General of the World Intellectual Property Organization, a United Nations body and US reaction.  A common thread of concern over “IP Theft” unites the US perspective on these issues.  This is the first of a two-part blog, focusing first on the Phase One effort.

The First Phase Agreement

Although a final text of the 86 page agreement is reportedly being “scrubbed” by both sides to the negotiations, and will not be available until January, the Office of the US Trade Representative has called Phase One

an historic and enforceable agreement on a Phase One trade deal that requires structural reforms and other changes to China’s economic and trade regime in the areas of intellectual property, technology transfer, … The Phase One agreement also…establishes a strong dispute resolution system that ensures prompt and effective implementation and enforcement.

USTR’s fact sheet outlines these accomplishments in IP:

Intellectual Property: The Intellectual Property (IP) chapter addresses numerous longstanding concerns in the areas of trade secrets, pharmaceutical-related intellectual property, geographical indications, trademarks, and enforcement against pirated and counterfeit goods.

Technology Transfer: The Technology Transfer chapter sets out binding and enforceable obligations to address several of the unfair technology transfer practices of China that were identified in USTR’s Section 301 investigation. For the first time in any trade agreement, China has agreed to end its long-standing practice of forcing or pressuring foreign companies to transfer their technology to Chinese companies as a condition for obtaining market access, administrative approvals, or receiving advantages from the government. China also commits to provide transparency, fairness, and due process in administrative proceedings and to have technology transfer and licensing take place on market terms. Separately, China further commits to refrain from directing or supporting outbound investments aimed at acquiring foreign technology pursuant to industrial plans that create distortion.

In light of prior bilateral commitments and accomplishments by the Trump Administration to date, the fact sheet adds little that is new.

Let’s pull the IP paragraph apart:

China has already amended its laws regarding trade secrets and trademarks.  The reference to pharmaceutical-related intellectual property is, however, one welcome encouragement of efforts that were recently proposed in the CCP/State Council Opinionsgulation of November 2019.  These changes were in play before the trade war was launched, but had since been delayed.  This welcome recommitment is well supported by a new national appellate IP court, as well as by a recent decision by the new appellate IP Court combining civil and administrative adjudication in a patent dispute, which may also be a harbinger of a possible combined civil/administrative adjudication with third parties in other areas, such as for patent linkage such as with the China’s food and drug authorities or patent authorities.

USTR refers to the Phase One agreement as addressing “long-standing concerns” about trade secrets and “enforcement against pirated and counterfeit goods.”  One of the “long-standing concerns” in trade secrets involved enhancing administrative enforcement of trade secrets.  This commitment was expressed in the 2012 US-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue and incorporated into plans of the National Leading Group.  Efforts to enhance “enforcement” against pirated and counterfeit goods appear is also redolent of increased administrative enforcement more generally – which downplays the significant changes underway in China’s judicial system, and have been the subject of numerous bilateral commitments under the former Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade.  For unknown reasons, many of the earlier JCCT commitments are no longer easily retrievable online, however, a list of commitments was prepared by GAO for the years 2004-2012, which demonstrates their long history.

Several factors combine to suggest that the US and China may be committing to a renewed focus on administrative enforcement: the role that administrative enforcement has played in the recent CPC-State Council Opinions on IP and other regulations, proposed legislation, and recent campaigns, and the problem of a long trade war without any acknowledged results which is affecting the markets and may drag into a presidential election cycle.  Late-term administrations may also be tempted to condone campaign-style IP enforcement, which can generate impressive enforcement statistics but have limited deterrence or long-term sustainability.    As Prof. Dimitrov has noted, IP campaigns are typically a “rapid resolution of a major problem,” done in response to a crisis or political pressure.  Prof. Mertha, another political scientist, described prior commitments to enforcement campaigns as part of the  “red face test: could the USTR state at a press conference, with a straight face, that the [trade] agreement was a good one.”  After much pain and drama, the Administration may yet be placing old wine in a new bottle, “rounding up the usual” enforcement outcomes —  as it ignores the scholarly literature surrounding campaign-driven outcomes of twenty to thirty years ago.  If these observations on Phase One are correct, then the goal of “structural change” in IP enforcement is illusive.

An administrative campaign focus would also ignore the low hanging fruit of China’s recent improvements and experiments in civil enforcement as well as pushing for further reform in administrative enforcement.  The Phase One Fact Sheet omits such pressing matters as continuing improvements in civil enforcement, long-standing problems with administrative enforcement transparency, promising developments in development of judicial precedent, the experiment of a new national appellate IP court similar to the CAFC,  the recent decline in foreign-related civil enforcement transparency, the dramatic decline in criminal IP enforcement including trade secret enforcement in the last several years, the need for rightsholders to have observable means of monitoring a trade agreement outcome in such areas as forced technology transfer or IP enforcement, or the impact of China’s aggressive antitrust regime on IP protection and commercialization, among other issues.   Enhanced punitive enforcement in enforcement, which both the US and China have also been calling for, may similarly be inconsistent with the primary goal of adequate compensation to victims of infringement. Furthermore, absent adequate procedural and substantive safeguards, this could also result in punishments being handed out to foreigners, as they have in the past.

The focus of an IP regime should instead be on transparency, fairness and adequate compensatory civil damages. Due to the many perceived weaknesses of China’s IP enforcement regime, the 2019 US-China Business Council, for example,  has noted in its 2019 survey that IPR enforcement was rated number 6 among the top 10 business challenges faced by the survey respondents.

The technology transfer language also contains much of the same old wine.  China committed to not conditioning foreign investment on technology transfer long before this trade war when it joined the WTO (2001).  It agreed at that time to provide for the “elimination and cessation of … technology transfer requirements” and that “the terms and conditions of technology transfer, production processes or other proprietary knowledge, particularly in the context of an investment, would only require agreement between the parties to the investment.“  Based on the Phase One fact sheet, it is also hard to see how Phase One agreement will add to the important additional legislative changes on this issue that China enacted earlier this year.

Rather than focus on legislative changes, the nature of the continued subsistence of forced technology transfer (FTT) is probably the more important trade issue at this time.  The 2019 Business Climate Survey of the American Chamber of Commerce in China characterized FTT as an “operational”, rather than a “legal” challenge, and placed technology transfer issues fifth in priority among IP-related concerns, well behind IP enforcement, with only 8 percent of respondents reporting it as the most significant IP issue their company faces.  This also appears to be the perspective of Prof. Prud’homme in his December 2019 presentation to the OECD, which outlines how FTT manifests itself.  Depending on the industrial sector, the Business Climate Survey notes that 41-58% of companies reported no difference in the amount of technology they shared with Chinese companies compared to other markets.  The US-China Business Council survey reached similar conclusions: technology transfer concerns ranked 24 out of 27 top concerns in the market. The Business Council further noted that only 5 percent of survey respondents report being asked to transfer technology in the past three years, yet the issue is an acute concern of affected companies in key sectors.

Has FTT declined as an issue of concern?  Earlier surveys by business chambers, before the trade war, suggested a higher incidence of FTT than is currently being reported.   Scholars and practitioners have also estimated that this issue has been exaggerated by the administration.  US data on sales of technology to China show a continued increase in technology licenses, as well as increases in licenses to unrelated parties, which may suggest greater confidence in the market and legal system.  One may argue about the sufficiency of the data, although the legal reforms and recent changes confirm to me that the principle strategic issue is how to ensure that technology is not lost through extra-legal /“operational” measures.

Another concern is that remedies for FTT  may end up again being another opaque process that may not bring the necessary relief.  As with the continuing emphasis on administrative enforcement of IP, China’s legislative efforts to date suggest that a principal remedy would be administrative remedies, as proposed implementing regulations to China’s Foreign Investment Law already suggest.

Conclusion: Is IP Any Different?

One of the better general overviews of the Phase One agreement had been written by Scott Kennedy for the Center for Strategic and International Studies.  Scott’s article “A Fragile and Costly US-China Trade Peace” notes that  “ [I]n the short-term China and Xi Jinping are the clear winners. With only limited concessions, China has been able to preserve its mercantilist economic system and continue its discriminatory industrial policies at the expense of China’s trading partners and the global economy. “

The fact sheet for Phase One suggests that further dramatic improvements since the notable accomplishments of earlier this year may not be in the offing.  Perhaps these will be negotiated as part of any “Phase Two” deal.  For the moment, there is certainly nothing in these outcomes which sets forth a “structural change” such as might include a shift to a private property oriented approach to IP, including support of a civil system, a more limited role for the administrative system and less state intervention into IP protection, enforcement, and commercialization.  There is also no reference to the greater transparency necessary to enable rightsholders and governments to understand how China’s enforcement mechanisms operate to protect private rights in China’s socialist market economy.

Now, let’s see what the scrubbed text brings…

Upcoming blog: on the nomination of Wang Binying to WIPO Director-General.

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Second Annual Berkeley-Tsinghua Transnational IP Litigation Conference Is Fast Approaching

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Berkeley Law and Tsinghua law will be co-hosting their Second Annual Conference on Transnational IP Litigation, at the campus of UC Berkeley on October 22, 2019.  Details, including registration information, are available here.

The program will look at strategic concerns in many of the hot issues in cross-border US-China IP litigation, including trade secret cases, standards-essential patents, whether foreigners “win” in each other’s jurisdictions, Section 337, criminal cases, on-line enforcement, civil litigation and the role of China’s new IP courts, administrative challenges to validity, forum non conveniens claims, enforcement at trade fairs, and other issues.  Please register soon if you are interested in attending.

We have great speakers and we look forward to having a great audience!

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Collaboration or Confrontation: Beyond the False Dichotomy in US-China IP Relations

Recently several writers have criticized the Trump administration’s strategic choice of confrontation over collaboration with China.  Among them was an open letter published in the July 2, 2019, Washington Post, “China is Not an Enemy,” or “Making China A US Enemy is Counterproductive” (based on its hyperlink) that was signed by several former officials and scholars. Prof. Alastair Iain Johnston of Harvard University also wrote an excellent article, “The Failures of the ‘Failure of Engagement’ with China.”  Chinese commentators have also chimed in.  One of the signatories of the July 2, 2019 letter, Jim McGregor spoke on a podcast about the limitations of collaboration.  A counter-letter, “Stay The Course On China: An Open Letter To President Trump” .  The debate is also an extension of the Stanford University report “China’s Influence and American Interests: Promoting Constructive Vigilance” from 2018, which also generated its share of controversy.

The authors of these studies discuss all aspects of the US-China relationship – trade, security, scientific, intellectual property, etc., and fold these issues into the collaboration vs. confrontation dichotomy. I lack the breadth to discuss all aspects of a complex relationship.  My focus is solely on IP and innovation and the role of collaboration or confrontation. 

An assumption of many of these authors is that we should avoid making China an enemy unnecessarily.  I agree. At the same time, many of the commentators seem to suggest that either IP engagement or confrontation may be counterproductive because of systemic failures of the WTO, or past disappointments.  As Prof. Johnston notes: “[T]here is no doubt that there are persistent WTO incompatible non-tariff trade barriers, including weak intellectual property protection, technology theft, and non-transparent regulatory practices, among others.” 

Overall, the IP-related arguments present a false dichotomy between engagement or confrontation.  Bilateral engagement is only one tool, and it need not be sacrificed to more assertive strategies.  The toolbox includes varied approaches. Softer advocacy might include training programs in China on novel issues, supporting more focused strategies by businesses, joint collaboration on shared challenges and trade agreements that include China (such as a bilateral investment treaty), to name a few.  More assertive postures might involve critical white papers or non-papers, multilateral engagement, WTO or other international law diplomacy or cases, trade agreements that exclude China (TPP), and, in appropriate circumstances, quid pro quo retaliation such as tariffs and sanctions.  Simply put, carrots and sticks are not exclusive of each other.  Moreover, there are a variety of carrots and sticks.  Sticks, however, carry a cost and need to be carefully considered before deploying.

One of the legacies of the Obama administration on IP was that it was over-committed to dialogues.  As Chinese trade diplomacy has been highly transactional, this had permitted China to “buy time” without committing to any trade concession.  For those who lived through Obama’s excesses and opposed them, President Trump has demonstrated himself to be Obama’s Hegelian opposite.

The explosion in IP dialogues during the Obama period is well documented. For example, the 2015 Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade (JCCT), which was co-chaired by the Department of Commerce and USTR and was the highest-ranking trade-specific bilateral dialogue.  It established IP-specific sub-dialogues, exchanges and programs on such topics as: standards, trade secrets, geographical indications, sports broadcasting, media boxes and copyright, on-line enforcement (including referrals to another IP-related working group involving criminal law), case law and databases with the judiciary, bad faith trademarks, copyright legislation, IP legislation and protection of plant varieties.  Additionally IP was discussed outside of the JCCT in dialogues with a range of US agencies, including antitrust (DOJ/FTC), criminal law (DOJ/DHS), innovation (OSTP) and strategic and economic dialogues (State, USTR, Treasury), as well as at the WTO (USTR), WIPO (PTO), and in plurilateral discussions, such as the IP-5 (the five largest patent offices), TM-5 (the five largest trademark offices) and ID-5 (the five largest industrial design offices).  There were also other dialogues, including judicial exchanges (2016) and commercial rule of law (2016), which also focused on IP.

Properly and economically utilized, dialogues can advance understanding where ignorance is a major impediment to resolving differences. They can build trust and long-lasting government to government relationships.  Dialogues may also spread the burden of advocacy among the US government, industry and trade associations and even foreign governments.  Educational training and assistance can also be leveraged for seeking additional concessions.  They also help establish a baseline for a measured approach to escalating issues to increasingly higher political levels.  However, dialogues should never become ends in themselves and need to be periodically evaluated for their effectiveness and efficiency.  

In a typical, hypothetical IP matter, a strategic approach to dialogues and engagement might involve a white-boarded multiple-year plan for the US that reflects the varying interests of the US government, foreign governments, industry, and academia.  The plan might progressively escalate concerns from a discussion around, say, bad faith trademarks, to a seminar on this topic, a meeting between the heads of the US and Chinese trademark offices, a JCCT meeting at a political level, a TM-5 meeting, a program with the International Trademark Association or the EU’s technical “IP Key” assistance effort, comments on proposed legislation, a meeting among cabinet-level officials and/or a WTO case.  These approaches may be consecutive or simultaneous. This type of strategy is also well known in Chinese military history, as “coordinating one’s strategies” 连环计 i.e., never relying on a single strategy but having many to fall back on, which is the 35th of the 36th classical military stratagems 三十六计. 

There have been several successful examples of coordinated engagement in IP that have delivered real changes over the years.  Examples include China’s providing design patent protection for graphical user interfaces, which involved multi-year engagement by industry, academia, the Chinese and US patent offices, and ultimately the offices of the JCCT, to deliver a tangible commitment in Chinese patent office practices.  Another example during the Obama period is the reform of China’s pharmaceutical patent examination process, which involved a similar process.   A longer-term engagement focused on the creation of China’s specialized appellate IP court.  It also involved several judges of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) (including former Chief Judge Rader), the Federal Circuit Bar Association, academia, and others over a nearly 20-year period.  

To be effective, however, dialogues must be strategic.  The 2015 JCCT, by contrast, seemed to have an approach of letting “a 100 dialogues bloom”  (百对话齐放).   

An example of the failure of dialogue and coordinated strategies is found in the US handling of a request of China to revise China’s discriminatory Administration of Technology Import/Export Regulations (TIER).  The 2015 JCCT included a commitment to “support a technology licensing joint seminar to be convened by MOFCOM in the first quarter of 2016.”  This was a strikingly modest ask of the very senior US and Chinese officials that chaired the JCCT: a Chinese Vice Premier and three US Cabinet-level officials.  However, JCCT support was necessary to overcome entrenched Chinese resistance. Moreover, despite the JCCT commitment, China did not follow through on this modest ask.  Despite such high level support, China did not host the seminar.   

During this same time period, the US Chamber of Commerce, Global IP Center,  published a report through its “Track II”, IP Cooperation Dialogue calling for reform in the TIER. The Track II Dialogue seeks to encourage expert non-government IP-engagement and not rely solely on over-politicized official bilateral dialogues.  It includes former judges and patent office officials, as well as academics (including this author). The 2016 Report also did little to convince official China to reform the TIER.

USG persisted.  The 2017 JCCT reiterated the commitment to “hold a joint seminar”. This program was ultimately convened on March 18, 2017,  However, the program concluded with no change in China’s position regarding the reform of the TIER.     

With no demonstrable momentum by China, USTR identified the TIER in its 301 investigation of China’s technology transfer practices.  It also filed a WTO case in March 2018. China finally took notice and amended these discriminatory provisions in 2019. Now that the offending provisions of the TIER have been amended, the WTO case has been suspended.  Today, with the suspension legal case, its full implementation should be monitored.  It appears that “collaboration” did not work, but a more confrontational approach resulted in a positive outcome.

However, while it is likely that China would not have amended the TIER absent the WTO case, dialogue on the TIER also played the important roles of coordinating USG positions, elevating an issue politically, involving other foreign governments, testing the waters with senior leadership in China, and making sure that the US proceeded in a measured and thoughtful manner.   Many foreign governments, including the European Union and Japan were involved in these dialogue efforts and many also supported the WTO case.  Even more striking, the WTO “win” on the TIER is ironic as it came from an administration (Trump) has generally shown opposition to multilateral institutions as well as dialogues.   In fact, the President has demonstrated that a thoughtful combination of collaboration and confrontation with a diversity of approaches may be the most effective for advancing IP and innovation issues.

Nor is it wrong to cast the United States as the sole cause of the demise of softer approaches.  China contributed to the demise of dialogues and similar mechanisms in its use of bilateral meetings as instruments of delay and retaliation.  It responded to the first WTO IP case that the US brought in 2007 as an “act of aggression” that it would “fight to the bitter end” in 2007 (DS/362).  China thereafter suspended many forms of IP-related cooperation with the US.   In the build-up to DS/362, the United States also sought to compel China to publish all its IP cases, which the WTO declined to support (a TRIPS “Article 63” request).  China also did not oblige in that request. 

DS/362  was the only WTO case brought against China on IP prior to the Trump administration. That case dealt with infringement of consumer goods – notably, copyright piracy and trademark counterfeiting, particularly criminal and customs remedies. DS/362 did not involve technology. Anybody claiming that the WTO has been a failure with respect to China’s enforcement of patents and trade secrets should look elsewhere.  That case has not yet been brought.

USTR likely viewed DS/362  was a failure. The US did not succeed in compelling China to amend its criminal IP laws in DS/362, nor in requiring China to make its cases publicly available.  As a consequence of losing the case, the US government lost faith in the WTO as a mechanism for resolving IP-related disputes. USTR instead launched a series of bilateral and multilateral negotiations, including a proposed Anticounterfeiting Trade Agreement and revised model IP texts in bilateral and plurilateral trade agreements.  

The ensuing devaluation of WTO mechanisms was, in my view, premature.  While lawsuits in the US often appear binary in their outcomes, pressuring foreign countries to adopt legal regimes that they are otherwise opposed to at the WTO is much more complex.  Additionally, US impatience is not well-justified as the US itself has also been slow in responding to many WTO rulings.  USTR’s assessment regarding DS/362 may also have reflected its own institutional limitations. USTR is thinly staffed and lacks resources to engage in softer programs such as technical training or monitoring.  USTR relies heavily on industry suggestions, which may also be short-term in nature.  Unlike other US government agencies involved in IP, USTR is not the lead USG agency in a number of important IP exchanges, such as at the World Intellectual Property Organization, Interpol or the World Customs Organization. It does not participate in or promote IP office related exchanges,  does not have IP officers or law enforcement officers posted to China, and does not have a China Resource Center like the USPTO, which provides statistical analyses of IP-trends in China.  Despite this lack of depth, it has two important primary functions: negotiates deals with trade officials and bring disputes. This binary choice is limited when compared to the much broader toolbox that can be used to address an IP issue. 

The arguments that the WTO does not work in addressing IP-related disputes also ignore the success achieved by the Trump administration in seeing the TIER revised, as well as the demonstrable impact that DS/362 had in elevating the importance of criminal trademark and copyright enforcement to China, despite the setback of a loss in dispute proceedings.  The victory the US achieved in the criminal enforcement case materialized in the form of an uptake in criminal IP prosecutions. China increased its criminal IP cases from 904 in 2007 (the date DS/362 was filed) to 15,121 cases, involving 17,869 people in 2012.  This is a  16 fold increase.  By 2012, the Chinese criminal IP docket also grew to over 200 times the  US criminal IP docket of 2018. which consisted of 117 defendants in 67 cases.  One Chinese Supreme People’s Court judge confided in me that he attributed that increase to the spotlight that the US gave to the importance of criminal IP in China’s evolving IP ecosystem. For some recent analysis on these trends, please see Dan Prud’homme and Zhang Taolue’s excellent book “China’s Intellectual Property Regime for Innovation” (Springer 2019) which summarizes recent research on this increase, and provides data on criminal IP cases, defendants, prosecutions and convictions.  

A similar argument regarding the ultimate success of the US claims might be made about the request of the US that China should make all its IP cases publicly available in 2005/2006 (the so-called “Article 63 Request”). By 2014, China had decided to publish the  majority of its cases of all types.  This publication of cases has been welcomed by the legal and judicial community alike and has helped to provide greater predictability in adjudication, minimize corruption and provide a basis for strategic IP enforcement.  

By contrast to these successes, there was one claim in DS/362 that had no significant positive impact.  This failure was not due to China’s intransigence. In DS/362 USTR also alleged that China’s disposal of seized infringing goods by auction offended WTO requirements to dispose of such goods outside of the channels of commerce.  However, WTO rules only require Chinese Customs to seize goods upon importation (TRIPS Agreement Art. 51). China was and remains primarily an exporter of counterfeit and pirated goods.  The WTO was unable to identify a single instance where China had auctioned off counterfeit goods imported into China.   “No infringing goods destined for importation”, the panel stated “have ever been auctioned…during the period for which statistics are available.” (Para. 7.351).  The Customs claim, criminal IP claim and the case publication achievement all underscore the continual need for good data to support IP engagement of either the “carrot” or “stick” variety.

Arguing over whether China is becoming our enemy and the need for confrontation is redolent of the post-Korean War China rhetoric in the US.  A better approach might be to remake the US government into an institution that better understands, persuades and strategizes on complex technological and IP issues in China.  During the past 30 – 40 years, the US government has defunded or terminated every technology–oriented agency that cared to engage in a significant way with China, including the Office of Technology Assessment in Congress, the Technology Administration in Commerce, and the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the White House.  USTR’s mandate is  too limited to effectively engage in collaboration. USPTO has the deepest technical resources on IP and innovation issues, but lacks political clout. We need to coordinate more closely, and provide incentives for deeper engagement among all US agencies as well as with industry in order to be effective.   These issues have been apparent since at least the time of China’s WTO accession.  As I noted at a conference at the 24th Annual Fordham University IP Conference in 2016 (Session 4B-b “Asia and the Political Landscape”):

MR COHEN:… One of the lessons from WTO accession was — and I don’t know how to say this gently — how … under-informed US industry was about the legal system.  I say that because if you look at the number of civil cases involving intellectual property, in the year that China joined the WTO — and the negotiations occurred in the years before — there were about thirty.  So one could, theoretically, have contacted every company that had filed a lawsuit involving IP and you still wouldn’t have a very large cohort.

So a lot of trade negotiations, unfortunately but necessarily, are based on hypothetical constructs.  What makes a good legal system, with big words like “impartial,” “fair”?…

METALITZ:  So who was under-informed in that situation?  Was it the US negotiators or was it the US industry?  US industry — you’re right — was not bringing these cases.  But that may not have been out of ignorance. That may have been out of a supposition that they would not be useful.

BAI:  May I chime in?… I have seen US government officials talking about China when they don’t get their briefing right…. 

One way to improve policy is to hire the right people.  We need to promote and reward individuals who have the three “magic” skills: knowledge of Chinese law, knowledge of Chinese IP  or technology, and Chinese language skills. These individuals should also be given roles commensurate with their knowledge and skills.  The 2013 Report of the Commission to Stop American IP Theft, also identified this as an issue in the staffing of our embassies overseas: 

Strengthen American diplomatic priorities in the protection of American IP. American ambassadors ought to be assessed on protecting intellectual property, as they are now assessed on promoting trade and exports. Raising the rank of IP attachés in countries in which theft is the most serious enhances their ability to protect American IP. 

The need to restructure US government on tech and IP issues has long affected the quality of our “engagement.”   

Whether confrontation or engagement are pursued, the choice is complex, should be well-coordinated, and will need to evolve based on circumstances.  It should be based on the right information made by well-informed people.  It is not, ultimately, an ideological issue as many of the recent articles might otherwise suggest.  

Revised: July 21, 2019, October 8, 2019.

 

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Unpacking the Role of IP Legislation in the Trade War

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Here is my attempt to unpack recent legislation and their relevance to the on-going trade dispute.

In recent months, China has amended its Foreign Investment Law, the Technology Import/Export Regulations (“TIER”), the Anti-Unfair Competition Law regarding trade secrets, and the Trademark Law, with new provisions on bad faith filings and damages. A summary of the Trademark Law revisions provided by SIPS is found here. China also amended the Joint Venture Regulations provisions removing provisions that which limited a foreign licensor’s freedom to license technology beyond years or to restrict use of licensed technology after the 10 year period had elapsed.

With the revisions to the TIER and the JV regulations, much of the basis for the US and EU complaints against China at the WTO regarding de jure forced technology transfer may have evaporated (WTO Disputes DS542, and DS549). However, the public dockets do not indicate that the cases have been withdrawn.

China seems to have determined that it has crossed a line in how much it can accommodate US demands. Bloomberg reported on a commentary published after the imposition of escalated sanctions in the influential “China Voice” column of the People’s Daily which accused the US of fabricating forced technology transfer claims. The commentary is entitled “If you want to condemn somebody, don’t worry about the pretext”, with the sub-title, written in classical Chinese: “‘Forced Technology Transfer’ Should Stop!”. (欲加之罪，何患无辞 – “中国强制转让技术论”可以休矣). The title is a quotation from the Zuo Zhuan, a classic of Chinese history written around 400 B.C. that realistically describes the palace intrigues, military tactics, assassinations, etc. from the chaotic “Spring and Autumn” period from 771-476 B.C. The People’s Daily view is also shared by a number of scholars and observers who view the problem as exaggerated or mischaracterized (apart from the TIER and JV regulations). However, this view has been rejected by USTR Lighthizer, as was reported in a recent NPR interview (March 25, 2019):

“CHANG: Though a number of scholars believe the Trump administration is overstating how often forced technology transfers are happening.

LIGHTHIZER: Well, I guess I don’t know who those scholars are. We did an eight-month study on it, and I think it’s the very strong view of the people that we talked to that it’s a very serious problem and has been for a number of years.”

(Update of May 21, 2019: A recent EU Chamber survey in fact showed an increase in businesses reporting that FTT is a concern, from 10% two years ago to 20%.)

There have also been several IP legislative developments that may not be as directly linked to US government trade pressure. Perhaps the most important is the launch of China’s new national appellate IP Court effective January 1, 2019. The NPC has released a draft of the civil code provisions on personality rights (See this translation). Personality rights can be important tools in addressing trademark squatting, such as in the Michael Jordan case with Qiaodan. CNIPA also released Draft Provisions for Regulating Applications for Trademark Registration （关于规范商标申请注册行为的若干规定（征求意见稿） which addresses bad faith registrations. CNIPA released a draft rule for public comment on Protection of Foreign GI’s (国外地理标志产品保护办法 （修订征求意见稿）on February 28, 2019. The comments focus on generic terms and a GI expert committee for examination of foreign GI’s. Here are INTA’s comments on the trademark registration and GI proposed rules. CNIPA also proposed changes to patent examination guidelines on such issues as proof of inventive step and what constitutes “common knowledge.” Here are AIPLA’s comments from April 4, 2019.

Still pending are proposed amendments to the Drug Administration Law, with comments due by May 25, 2019. This is a second public comment draft released by the NPC. Ropes & Gray has provided a useful analysis. The proposed changes to the DAL also include increased punitive damages for counterfeit medicines, in line with increased penalties in the IP laws (Trademark, AUCL, etc.). There are also proposed changes to the patent law which was released for comment earlier this year. Of particular interest to the pharma sector in the proposed changes were provisions calling for patent term restoration. However, a hoped for inclusion of patent linkage through an “artificial infringement” provision to trigger an infringement challenge by reason of a pharmaceutical regulatory approval has not yet materialized. There were also rumors that China and USTR has scaled back regulatory data protection for biologics from the 12 years that had originally been proposed by China in 2018 to the 10 year period provided by the US Mexico Canada Free Trade Agreement.

What is the relationship between all these legislative changes and the trade war? Larry Kudlow, the Director of the National Economic Council, described the legislative snafu that caused the administration to reinstitute tariffs as follows:

“For many years, China trade, it was unfair, nonreciprocal, unbalanced, in many cases, unlawful. And so, we have to correct those and one of the sticking points right now as we would like to see these corrections in an agreement which is codified by law in China, not just the state council announcement. We need to see something much clearer. And until we do, we have to keep our tariffs on, that’s part of the enforcement process as far as we are concerned.”

So what are the unenacted “laws” and what is the State Council “announcement” that Mr. Kudlow is referring to and which in his view launched this new trade war escalation? I doubt that Mr. Kudlow has read China’s Law on Legislation and understands the difference between a Law passed by the NPC and a State Council Regulation, particularly as US and European practice in recent months appears to be oblivious of legislative nomenclature and its role in determining what constitutes a legally binding document.

Perhaps Mr. Kudlow is talking about the NDRC 38 agency MOU published in late 2018 regarding punishments for serious patent infringement, including use of social credit system. The NDRC document is clearly inferior to a Law or State Council Regulation, but it was a directly promulgated document of a State Council agency. As the patent law amendments have not been enacted yet, he may be referring to this delay in enactment and the failure to increase damages for infringement as has been provided by other statutes. In my own view, the focus on punitive or even statutory damages is misguided as is increased administrative enforcement, as the primary reason that damages are low is the failure of most Chinese courts to impose fully compensatory damages and abide by priorities in law for establishing damages. But I hope to have more on that in another blog…

One thing is certain: China has been timing legislative developments with trade diplomacy. This may lead one to believe that China’s approach to the new laws was purely transactional, and/or there were other laws that the US was also expecting but that China has since declined to deliver. The previously mentioned NDRC 38 Agency MOU was enacted before the G-20 meeting but made publicly available shortly thereafter. The “Working Measures [sic] for Outbound Transfer of Intellectual Property Rights (For Trial Implementation), (State Council, Guo Ban Fa [2018] No. 19)” (知识产权对外转让有关工作办法（试行）) which was previously discussed here, appear to have been timed with the 301 announcement in March 2018. In addition, the revocation of TIER provisions, JV implementing regulations, and amendments to the Trademark Law and AUCL revisions all were enacted with incredible efficiency, often denying any opportunity for meaningful public comment in violation of prior procedural practices. A reasonable guess may be that there were some additional laws or regulations that the US was expecting but that China had determined it could not deliver, or deliver in the time frame provided. Nonetheless, the legislative track record thus far is quite impressive.

China’s improved environment for technology transfer and technology collaboration is coming at a time when the United States has tightened up its controls with China. The most notable legislation in this area is the John S. McCain Defense Authorization Act for 2018 (the “Act”), including the enactment of the Foreign Investment Risk Reduction Modernization Act and the Export Controls Act of 2018. These laws extended export control and foreign investment control authorities to foundational and emerging technologies, as well as to non-passive, non-controlling investments. Much of the technologies of concern overlap with Made in China 2025 and other Chinese industrial policy documents. Although the Act did not specifically create “black” and “white” countries as subjects of controls, the Congressional history did point to special concerns about China:

“Congress declares that long-term strategic competition with China is a principal priority for the United States that requires the integration of multiple elements of national power, including diplomatic, economic, intelligence, law enforcement, and military elements, to protect and strengthen national [t]security, [including] … the use of economic tools, including market access and investment to gain access to sensitive United States industries.”

The most recent report which analyzes the impact of US and Chinese regulations on Chinese investment in the United States by Rhodium Group is found here (May 8, 2019). The report notes an “over 80% decline in Chinese FDI in the US to just $5 billion from $29 billion in 2017 and $46 billion in 2016. Accounting for asset divestitures, net 2018 Chinese FDI in the US was -$8 billion. Meanwhile, American FDI in China dropped only slightly to $13 billion in 2018 from $14 billion in 2017.” The Rhodium report also notes that “the chilling impact of politics on US FDI in China was mostly visible in the ICT space where new investment declined significantly last year.” Other countries have also been enacting similar restrictions on FDI in sensitive areas, as pointed out in a recent article by my Berkeley colleague Vinod K. Aggarawal. Note: I will be speaking at a forthcoming AIPLA webinar on export controls and IP strategies on May 23, 2019 as well as at forthcoming events in China (to be announced).

In addition to these legislative efforts, the US has undertaken steps to restrict H1B visas for talented scientists and engineers and the FBI has created a new working group to address economic espionage from China. The Committee of 100 released an important paper in 2017 showing that Asian Americans were more likely to be prosecuted for economic espionage than any other ethnic group, are also subject to higher sentences and were twice as likely as other groups to have cases against them dismissed. Some observers fear that overly broad regulation and enforcement by the United States may now be encouraging exactly what China has sought to do for decades: repatriate to China the vast talent pool of Chinese scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs to contribute to the technological development of the motherland.

Although there have been few legislative efforts directed to making US science and technology more competitive in response to these perceived threats from China, there have been several general reports and proposals. The National Institute of Science and Technology recently released a green paper, “Return on Investment Initiative for Unleashing American Innovation” (April 2019) to improve federal technology transfer and entrepreneurship. There are increasing calls for Congress to fund the long defunct Office of Technology Assessment, which once played an active role in analyzing US-China technology trade.

Several trade organizations and think tanks have called for increased US funding in science and technology, among them is the recent report of the Task Force of American Innovation, “Second Place America – Increasing Challenges to America’s Scientific Leadership” (May 7, 2019). The R&D graph at the head of this blog showing China’s rapid growth in R&D is from that report. The report notes:

“America’s competitive edge is now at stake, as China and other countries are rapidly increasing investments in research and workforce development in order to assume positions of global leadership. Our nation risks falling perilously behind in the basic scientific research that drives innovation, as our global competitors increase support for cutting-edge research and push to the forefront in fields such as artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, aerospace, advanced manufacturing, and the next generation of telecommunications networks.”

To round out this summary of legislative developments, there have been developments at the USPTO that impact US relations with China on IP. The USPTO published a proposed regulation which will regulate legal services for the rapidly increasing number of Chinese pro se trademark filers in the US (2/15/2019). This proposed regulation would require these applications to use a US licensed attorney. The purported purpose of this change in current practice is “instill greater confidence in the public that U.S. registrations that issue to foreign applicants are not subject to invalidation for reasons such as improper signatures and use claims and enable the USPTO to more effectively use available mechanisms to enforce foreign applicant compliance with statutory and regulatory requirements in trademark matters.” The rule also seems generally consistent with TRIPS Art. 3, which permits WTO members to require “the appointment of an agent within the jurisdiction of a Member … to secure compliance with laws and regulations which are not inconsistent with the provisions of [the TRIPS] Agreement”.

Another important development involves USPTO efforts to clarify subject matter eligibility under Sec. 101 of the patent act, and functional claim limitations for computer-enabled inventions under Section 112. The United States had been weakening and destabilizing protections in these important areas affecting artificial intelligence, fintech and biotech inventions at the precise time when China had been strengthening its protections. These are important steps towards strengthening predictability in our domestic IP system, which may be further strengthened by proposed legislative changes.

Ironically, China’s improvements in its investment and tech transfer environment are coming at a time of heightened concern over a Chinese technological threat and increased US and international regulatory scrutiny. It may be difficult, therefore, to perceive any immediate positive impact from changes in China’s investment environment. Indeed, the media has recently been reporting on decisions of different companies or entrepreneurs to close down R&D operations in each other’s markets. Hopefully, both countries may ultimately create the right mix of IP enforcement and protection, regulatory controls over collaboration and industrial policy to enable bilateral scientific collaboration to once again flourish and contribute to the global economy.