On August 30, 2013, the Fourth Session of the Twelfth NPC Standing Committee reviewed and adopted the decision on revising the Trademark Law. The new Trademark Law re-establishes the protection system on well-known trademark, clarifies the concept of well-known trademarks, and further specifies the recognition principles on well-known trademark. Aiming at the problems that should be solved in practice, SAIC revised the original provisions in accordance with requirements of the new Trademark Law.

It is understood that there are 21 articles after the revision: First, it specifies legislative basis, definition of well-known trademarks, recognition subject and recognition principles; Second, from the perspective of the party requesting well-known trademark protection, it clearly states the proposition for identifying protection request and requirements for evidence in different types of cases; it clarifies strengthening of routine focused protection of well-known trademarks and applicability of well-known trademarks protection records, from two aspects of standardizing handling procedures and recognition criteria of well-known trademarks cases,.

Compared with the previous provisions, this revision highlights the legal nature required for case handling, facilitates the parties to understand evidence requirements, clarifies responsibilities of the parties and the industry and commerce authorities, and regulates the handling of issues related to well-known trademark cases.

Shen Changyu said that, as of the end of last year, China's invention patent applications have ranked first in the world for three consecutive years, trademark registration applications have ranked first in the world for 12 consecutive years, and copyright registration and application of new varieties of plants are all at the forefront in the international arena. Shen said that, over 30 years after China joined the World Intellectual Property Organization in 1980 , China IPR-related departments have participated in 19 international treaties under jurisdiction of WIPO, becoming one of the most dynamic and most important members in the arena of world intellectual property. China office of WIPO will provide Chinese companies and innovators with international services of intellectual property, to help them better participate in international cooperation and exchange of intellectual property rights, and turn China into an intellectual power from an intellectual country.

He Xiaorong, from Judicial Reform Office of Supreme People's Court, introduced that, to establish a judicial jurisdiction system separated appropriately from administrative division, the Program determines major measures in the jurisdiction system, court management, institutional settings and court setting. In terms of court setting, it proposes to promote the establishment of intellectual property courts in the areas with many intellectual property cases.

The Supreme People's Court's decision on amending Several Provisions of Applicable Laws for Hearing Patent Disputes by Supreme People's Court" (Draft for Public Comments)

I. Item 2 of Article 5 The infringement location includes: location for implementing product manufacture, use, committed sales, sales, import and other acts infringing invention and utility model patents; location for implementing use of patented method, and location for implementing product use, committed sales, sales, import and other acts directly obtaining products by such patented method; location for implementing manufacture, committed sales, sales, import and other acts of design patents; location for implementing counterfeiting patents of others. Location for infringement results of the above-mentioned infringements.

II. Item 1 of Article 8 For patent infringement lawsuit for utility model patents filed before October 1, 2009 (excluding this day), the plaintiff can produce search report issued by the patent administration department under the State Council at the time of prosecution; for patent infringement lawsuit for utility model or design patents filed after October 1, 2009, the plaintiff may produce the patent evaluation report issued by the patent administration department under the State Council at the time of prosecution. The court may require the plaintiff to submit search report or patent evaluation report. The court may decide to suspend the proceedings if the plaintiff refuses to make submission without good reason.

III. Item 1 of Article 9 No subject that may result in invalidity of utility model and design patents is found in the searching report or patent evaluation report produced by the plaintiff.

IV. Article 17 Item 1 of Article 59 of Patent Law expresses that "the protection scope of the invention or utility model patent is subject to the content of its claims, and the description and drawings can be used to explain the contents of the claims". That is, the patent protection scope shall be subject to the scope determined by all the technical features described in the claims, including the scope determined by features equivalent to such technical features.

Equivalent features refer to the technical features recorded that realizing substantially the same function and achieving substantially the same results by substantially the same means, which an ordinary skilled person in this field can associate without going through creative effort at the date of the alleged infringement.

V. Article 19 For counterfeiting patent, the court may pursue its civil liability in accordance with provisions of Article 63 of the Patent Law. If no administrative punishment is given by the patent administration department, the court may grant civil sanctions in accordance with Item 3 of Article 134 of the Civil Code, and the applicable civil fines may be determined with reference to provisions of Article 63 of the Patent Law.

VI. Article 20 In accordance with the provisions of Article 65 of the Patent Law, the patent holder’s actual loss from infringement can be calculated by multiplying the total reduction in sales of patented products due to infringement with reasonable profit of each patented product,. If the patent holder’s total reduction in sales is difficult to determine, the total number of infringing products sold in the market multiplying reasonable profit of each patented product can be regarded as the actual loss suffered by the patent holder from infringement.

Article 65 of the Patent Law provides that the interest obtained by the infringer through infringement can be calculated by multiplying the total sales of the infringing product in the market with reasonable profit of each infringing product. The interest obtained by the infringer through infringement is generally calculated based on the infringer's operating profit. For infringers entirely engaged in infringement, it can be calculated based on the sales profit.

VII. Article 21 If the loss of the patent holder or the interest of the infringer is difficult to determine, with patent licensing fees for reference, the people's court may refer to the multiples of patent licensing fees to reasonably determine the amount of compensation, based on the type of patent, the nature and extent of infringement, the nature of patent licensing, scope, timing and other factors; if there’s no patent licensing fees for reference or the patent licensing fees are apparently unreasonable, the people's court may determine the amount of compensation based on the type of patent, the nature and extent of infringement and other factors, in accordance with the provisions in the Item 2 of Article 65 of the Patent law.

VIII. Article 22 If the patent holder claims for reasonable expense to stop the infringement, the court may calculate otherwise in addition to the amount of compensation determined by Article 65 of the Patent Law.

IX. Article 24 The offer for sale referred to in Article 11 and 69 of the Patent Law, means the intention to sell the commodity by advertising, displaying in shop windows or exhibiting at a trade show, etc..

WIPO Director General Francis Gurry said that, the Global Innovation Index is unique as a tool to measure and promote innovation performance. The Index recognizes the central role of innovation in creating strong and sustainable employment with balanced growth.

It is understood that the Index has adopted 81 indicators for annual assessment on 143 economics in the world for 7 years till now.

The report shows that, from the ranking of the first instance courts of patent infringement lawsuit, Guangzhou Intermediate People's Court of Guangdong Province has the most cases accepted, accounting for up to 21.32%, and the No.1 Intermediate People's Court and No.2 Intermediate People's Court in Shanghai and Beijing are among the top ten, accounting for about 10% altogether. The report believes that the ranking is basically in positive correlation with economic development level and quality of economic growth in different regions.

From proxy of patent litigation, nearly nine-tenths of the parties in patent infringement lawsuits have chosen agency to participate in proceedings, much higher than other civil cases (3-30% proxy rate). The report believes that, the reason for the high proxy rate of such cases, on one hand, lies in that the patent infringement litigation often involves cutting-edge technology and complex legal rules in specific areas, which have higher requirements for the parties involved in the proceedings, and on the other hand, most of the parties in such cases are commercial entities, whose markets will be greatly influenced by the case to which they will attach more importance.

After the Sino- British PPH pilot started, the applicant can make PPH request to SIPO in accordance with Process for Making PPH Request to the State Intellectual Property Office of the P.R.C (SIPO) under Sino-British Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) Pilot; and make PPH request to UKIPO in accordance with Process for Making PPH Request to the UK Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO)under the Britain-China Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) Pilot.

After the Sino-Iceland PPH pilot started, the applicant can make PPH request to SIPO in accordance with Process for Making PPH request to SIPO under Sino-Iceland Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) Pilot; and make PPH request to IPO in accordance with the Process for Making PPH Request to the Icelandic Patent Office (IPO) under Iceland-China Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) Pilot and Process for Making PCT-PPH Request to the Icelandic Patent Office (IPO) under Iceland-China PCT-Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) Pilot.

After the Sino-Swedish PPH pilot started, the applicant can make PPH request to SIPO in accordance with Process for Making PPH Request to State Intellectual Property Office of the P.R.C (SIPO) under Sino-Swedish Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) Pilot; and make PPH request to PRV in accordance with Process for Making PPH Request to Swedish Patent and Registration Office (PRV) under Sweden-China Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) Pilot.

It is reported that the individual, business or organization holding trademark documents or trademark application can simply apply through registration service agent reviewed and certified by ICANN ".商标" Domain Name Registration Authority. After approval, the consumer can login the official website designated by the company by directly entering "corporate brand .商标" in the browser address bar, which is authoritative and unique.

There are 45 categories based on Commodity Classification for International Trademark Registration (Nice Classification), considering the cost, companies generally register only one category on goods to be used, which leaves room for cybersquatting by fake brand and free riders. For example, the recently touted Tesla Motors (TESLA) trademark events: a Guangzhou businessman with no qualification for car production, opened an online auto parts store to apply for "Tesla" trademark in China. After Tesla Motors entered China, it carried out a lot of work in the last minute of trademark opposition, or else it would suffer immeasurable loss, which sounded the alarm to the enterprise that online intellectual property protection is imminent.

Watch the trial:

Sogou company alleged that Xi'an users found 360 tampering default browser

In the trial, Sogou Information Company and Sogou Technology company claimed, "Sogou browser" was the core software product independently developed by itself. On September 22, 2013, Sogou users in Xi'an, Sogou Information Company and Sogou Technology Company found that, Qihoo Technology Company and Qihoo 360 Company provided downloading of "360 Security Guards”, “360 Anti-virus" and “360 Secure Browser” (Qihoo Technology Inc. is the copyright owner of these three software and Qihoo 360 is the publisher of them) through its website of www.360.cn, and the defendant automatically tampered the original default setting of Sogou browser into 360 security browser default setting without permission by network users when they run "360 Antivirus" for full scan and repair of "proposed repair item".

In addition, when Internet users set Sogou browser as the default, "360 security guards" will pop out warning that "a program is modifying the default browser setting", even if the network user clicks the "Allow to modify", Qihoo Technology Company and Qihoo 360 Company will tamper the original default setting into 360 secure browser default setting without permission by users. The plaintiffs submitted and presented the notarized instruments and screenshots to the court to support their claims.

Sogou claims RMB 45 million loss to 360

Sogou Information Company and Sogou Technology Company believe that such acts of the defendant-Qihoo Technology Company and Qihoo 360 Company not only seriously disturbed the normal operation of Sogou browser of the plaintiff, but also seriously affected network users’ evaluation on service stability and safety of Sogou browser, and greatly reduced the traffic of Sogou browser user, which damaged the advertising revenue and operating income of the plaintiff based on Sogou browser. That is, the above acts of the defendant have caused huge economic losses to the plaintiff, and greatly damaged the business reputation and product reputation of the plaintiff, which violated basic principles of business ethics and fair play, honesty and credibility recognized by the Internet industry, which not only damaged the legitimate rights and interests of the plaintiff, but also disrupted the normal order of competition in the Internet industry. Therefore, it was taken to court. Sogou requested the defendant should immediately stop acts of unfair competition, including but not limited to, to stop tampering Sogou browser's default setting with "360 Anti-virus", to stop tampering Sogou browser's default setting with "360 Security Guards"; 360 should make apologies for its unfair competition to the plaintiff for one whole month on its website prominently, and in prominent positions on Home page of Sina, Sohu and Netease, to eliminate the influence; and should compensate the plaintiff an economic loss of RMB 45 million yuan, and RMB 500,000 yuan of reasonable expenses for the case.

Whether it is multiplicity of actions, whether it will constitute a unfair competition are the focus issues debated in the court.

At the trial, whether the subject qualification of the two defendants is reasonable, whether complaints of the alleged unfair competition is multiplicity of actions or partly multiplicity actions with proceedings heard by Beijing Second Intermediate Court, whether the defendant has committed acts of unfair competition, and the undertaking of tort liability are the focuses in the court.

The trial lasted three hours, and both sides expressed their willingness to mediate

The trial lasted for three hours. After the final statement by the parties, the presiding judge encouraged the parties to mediate, and both parties expressed in court their "willingness to mediate." Xi'an Intermediate People's Court will do mediation according to the law, and the case continues to be heard.

At the seminar, the both sides reached an agreement on training outstanding legal personnel, building theory and practice capacity and other matters. The specific contents of the cooperation agreement include: the Law School of Tongji University will set up "Intellectual Property Research Institute Teaching Practice Base" in Unitalen, and employ experienced lawyers and agents from Unitalen as part-time teachers for intellectual property practice courses and practice mentors for student at school; meanwhile, Unitalen will set up "Unitalen Research and Training Base" in the Law School of Tongji University, for exchanges with students on IPR applications, management and other practice. In addition, the both sides will cooperate in topic research, case studies, resource sharing, practical teaching and other aspects.