As 70% of the applications were from enterprises, enterprises have become the main force of domestic PCT applications. Filing over 1,544 and 430 applications for PCT respectively, Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd and ZTE Corporation ranked as the top two PCT applicants among all other local enterprises. It indicated that Huawei, ZTE and other domestic leading technology enterprises have increased their international patent registration move.

Most Chinese PCT applications were from the technical field, among which, applications in electrology covered more than half of the total volume. The majority of the electrology applications involved telecommunication, making it one of the most prosperous sectors in China's technological innovation. It also shows that some Chinese enterprises have been able to carry out independent innovation.

The majority of overseas PCT applications were from world-known companies. As most of those companies had launched part of Research & Development activities in China and SIPO's examination ability has been dramatically improved, the number of PCT application filed with SIPO from overseas companies realized gradual increase.

In the last five years, the ministry coordinated related departments to launch special campaigns on IPR protection, implemented the project of IPR Protection Network Construction, and set up 50 tip-off centers for IPR protection across the country. Of the 160,000 investigated IPR infringement cases, more than 8,400 were put into legal procedures and more than 7,300 were concluded.

In 2007, China Customs worked along with the public security authorities to establish an interactive cooperation system, which made great breakthrough in combating IPR crimes.

In addition, according to Meng Yang, director of Policy and Regulation Department of General Administration of Customs, the interactive cooperation system achieved great improvement over last year. China reached consensus on IPR border protection with USA, EU, Japan and Korea.

The Shanghai First Intermediate People's Court have ruled recently at the first instance that four of the defendants, excluding Ganghui, to cease the infringement and pay compensations ranging between 15,000 RMB and 400,000 RMB respectively.

Court investigation shows that the five distributors were selling dresses labeled “LA CITY”, which were manufactured by the Shanghai Lachapelle Dress Co., Ltd. between May to July, 2006. Meanwhile, some of their franchised stores put up advertisements of “LA CITY”. On November 13, 2006, La City took photos of a Lachapelle franchised shop in Jiangnan Plaza, Jiaxing City, Zhejiang Province. The photos showed that the Lachapelle franchised shop displayed ads of “La Chapelle City” and “LA CITY”. The Lachapelle Dress Co., Ltd. also disseminated brochures for dresses labeled “LA CITY” boasting “LA CITY” has become a fashion brand popular among ladies in big cities within two years since it was launched in 2004. Therefore, La City filed a lawsuit against all the defendants for the claim of infringement and won the case.

Beijing Higher People's Court issued the judgment of last resort recently on a trademark litigation between French LACOSTE Co. and Singapore Crocodile International Pte Ltd, which has caused extensive public attention, in favor of Singapore Crocodile. The court ruled that the trademark “CARTELO Crocodile (in Chinese characters)” filed with the Chinese Trade Mark Office (CTMO) under the name of Singapore Crocodile is lawful and valid and should be granted registration.

Singapore Crocodile filed the trademark “CARTELO and device” with CTMO on December 24, 1993, then French LACOSTE raised an opposition against it. CTMO adjudicated on October 22, 2003 that the trademark “CARTELO and device” should be granted registration. French LACOSTE appealed against the adjudication. The China Trademark Review and Adjudication Board (CTRAB) released an adjudication on June 30, 2005 in favor of Singapore Crocodile that the trademark at issue should be granted with registration. French LACOSTE then brought a lawsuit to the Beijing First Intermediate Peoples' Court, asking for withdrawal of the adjudication from CTRAB. Upon trial, the court withdrew the adjudication from CTRAB and ordered it to re-make an adjudication within three months. Both CTRAB and Singapore Crocodile refused to accept the judgment and appealed respectively to the Beijing Higher People's Court.

The Beijing Higher People's Court upheld that “CARTELO and device” is a trademark of combination of a word and a device, which designates a specific color. The self-created word portion “CARTELO” has distinctiveness and originality since it has no antecedent meaning. In the whole trademark, the word portion is primary and the device portion as a background composed of a three-color rectangle of green, blue and red as well as a realistic figure of crocodile in the midst of the word is subsidiary. Though the crocodile figure is similar to a figurative trademark of French LACOSTE and the two vary from each other in the directions which the crocodiles face. Nevertheless, the two trademarks are obviously different from each other in terms of word composition, pronunciation and integrative appearance. Furthermore, those two marks have co-existed for many years and respectively enjoy their high reputations and have their own distinctiveness. Based on their ordinary perception, the relative public are able to distinguish the two trademarks and it is impossible to cause confusion or mistakes. Therefore, the two trademarks are not similar while representing similar products.

Beijing Higher People's Court finally withdrew the judgment from the Beijing First Intermediate People's Court and sustained the adjudication from CTRAB, granting registration of the trademark “CARTELO Crocodile (in Chinese characters)”.