Appointed Translators: Jason WANG / Austin CHANG, Beijing East IP Law Firm
Author: Baoqing ZANG, Trademark Review and Adjudication Board (TRAB)
Original Chinese text: China Industry and Commerce Newspaper June 21, 2016

On April 26, the Guangdong Higher People’s Court issued Guidelines for Trial of Dispute Cases Involving Standard Essential Patents (for Trial Implementation) (the “Guidelines”). The Guidelines includes 32 articles and focuses on the following four aspects: 1. General issues regarding standard essential patent (SEP) dispute cases; 2. Issues on civil liability for ceasing implementation of an SEP; 3. Issues for determining SEP license fees; and 4. Issues for anti-trust dispute trial involving SEP.

On April 27, 2018, the Zhongguancun Intellectual Property Promotion Conference 2018 was held in Beijing. The conference was jointly sponsored by the Beijing Municipal Intellectual Property Office, the Management Committee of the Zhongguancun Science Park, and the Center for Patent Examination Collaboration Beijing Center of the Patent Office of the State Intellectual Property Office of China. Zhongguancun Intellectual Property Promotion Bureau and the Capital Intellectual Property Service Industry Association jointly organized the conference. The topic of the conference was “Optimizing Patent Management Services; Assisting Science and Innovation Center Construction.” During the conference, 13 patent attorneys from BEIP were appointed by Zhongguancun Intellectual Property Promotion Bureau as Zhongguancun foreign intellectual property service experts.

On April 24, 2018, the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) published the Annual Report on Intellectual Property Cases of the Supreme People’s Court (2017). The Annual Report selected 33 typical cases from IP and unfair competition cases concluded by SPC in 2017 and summarized 42 applicable legal issues with instructional significance, reflecting thoughts and judgment methods of SPC on hearing new, difficult, and complex cases in IP and unfair competition fields.

Background

Samsung initiated a cross-licensing discussion in July 2011 with Huawei on standard essential patent (SEP), both parties could not come to agreeable terms in the next six years. On May 25, 2016, Huawei filed two lawsuits alleging Samsung infringed on two of its 4G SEPs No. 201110269715.3 (Method and apparatus for sending control signaling), and No. 201010137731.2 (Method, base station, and user equipment for feeding back ACK/NACK information for carrier aggregation) before the Shenzhen Intermediate Court and requested for an injunctive relief.

BEIJING, September 2017 – In the lead of Office of the National Leading Group on the Fight Against IPR Infringement and Counterfeiting and with the support of China Industry-University-Research Institute Collaboration Association, national primary associations China Anti-Infringement and Anti-Counterfeit Innovation Strategic Alliance (hereinafter referred to be “the Alliance”) in cooperation with hundreds of enterprises and public institutions.

On 15th of March 2018, in the evaluation of Outstanding Patent Attorney and Patent Agency of the Year held by Goldwind, our client, Beijing East IP Ltd. was awarded Outstanding Patent Agency of the Year for our serious and responsible attitude as well as professional service toward clients. Several attorneys of our company won the Distinguished Service Award, the Distinguished Contribution Award, and the title of “Talented Patent Writer”.

BEIJING, December 8 – Dr. Xiaodong LI, president of our company, was selected to be a member of the Legal Advisory Team of Overseas Chinese Affairs Office of the State Council. The Legal Advisory Team consists of professional lawyers specializing in different fields and aims to protect the lawful rights and interests of returned overseas Chinese and their relative and Hong Kong and Macau compatriots by offering them legal advice and aid.

BEIJING, March 2–Beijing Patent Attorneys Association released the 2017 star-rating list of patent agencies in Beijing. Beijing East IP was awarded as a Four-Star Patent Agency of 2017.

China has three types of patents, i.e., invention, utility model, and design. The utility model patent does not have the counterpart in some other jurisdictions such as the USA, so some essential aspects of the utility model patent will be introduced below for better understanding of it.