In a decision (（2018）京民初127号) released December 30, 2020, the Beijing Higher People’s Court ruled in favor of Beijing Yanhuang Yingdong Technology Development Co., Ltd. (北京炎黄盈动科技发展有限责任公司) against Amazon Connect Technology Services (Beijing) Co., Ltd. (亚马逊通技术服务（北京）有限公司), an Amazon subsidiary, and co-defendant Beijing Sinnet Technology Co., Ltd. (北京光环新网科技股份有限公司). The plaintiff Yanhuang had sued the defendants on July 12, 2018 for trademark infringement of its mark “AWS” (the acronym for Amazon Web Services for cloud computing). The Court awarded Yanhuang a total of 76,723,000 …
NBA Star Michael Jordan Wins Huge Chinese Victory Against Qiaodan (Jordan) Sports Over Misuse of His Name
On December 30, 2020, the Shanghai Second Intermediate People’s Court ruled in favor of Michael Jordan against Qiaodan Sports Co. (Qiaodan is the transliteration of Jordan into Chinese) (乔丹体育公司) over the use of Jordan’s Chinese name. The Court ruled that Qiadoan Sports Co. publicly apologize in newspapers and the Internet to clarify the relationship between the parties; stop using Qiaodan its in corporate name; stop using Qiaodan trademarks except for those that exceed the 5-year statute of limitations, in which …
Shanghai Higher People’s Court Upholds 6-Year Prison Term and 90 Million RMB Fine for Lego Chinese Copyright Infringer
On December 29, 2020, the Shanghai Higher People’s Court announced the upholding of a criminal conviction for infringing the copyright of Lego toys. The Shanghai Third Intermediate Court had sentenced 9 people to up to 6 years in prison and a 90 million RMB (~$13 million USD) fine. The group of 9 had sold over 300 million RMB of infringing products under the Lepin (乐拼) brand and had over 30 million RMB of infringing products stored ready for sale.
China’s National People’s Congress Passes Amended Criminal Law Adding an Economic Espionage Article and Increasing Prison Time for Intellectual Property Crimes
On December 26, 2020, the Twenty-Fourth Meeting of the Standing Committee of the 13th National People’s Congress of China voted to pass the “Amendment to the Criminal Law of the People’s Republic of China (11)” (中华人民共和国刑法修正案（十一）), which will go into effect on March 1, 2021. The Criminal Law includes several articles for intellectual property crime and the amendments increase the maximum sentencing term. The amendments also add a new article somewhat similar to the US’ Economic Espionage Act potentially in …