In an announcement from the Shanghai High People’s Court on November 3, 2022, the People’s Court of Chongming District, Shanghai Municipality sentenced defendant Ding to imprisonment of five years for the crime of counterfeiting a registered trademark and imposed a fine of 1.5 million RMB (~$209 thousand USD). Ding had sold 58,813 counterfeit watches bearing the Emporio Armani trademark having a value of 9,153,683 RMB (~$1.27 million USD).
China’s National Intellectual Property Administration Releases New Draft of the Patent Examination Guidelines
On October 31, 2022, China’s National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) released another draft of the Patent Examination Guidelines, which is somewhat analogous to the US Patent & Trademark Office’s (USPTO) Manual of Patent Examining Procedure (MPEP). Some highlights include explaining how patent term adjustment and patent term extension will work; providing for partial designs; late priority claims; and deletes the 15-day mail delay for electronically-delivered documents. Comments are due December 15, 2022, which may enable CNIPA to meet its target …
King Semi Settles Chinese Criminal Trade Secret Case for 60 Million RMB
On October 27, 2022, Shenyang Xinyuan Microelectronics (doing business as King Semi) announced in a securities filing that it had settled a trade secret case with an unnamed company for 60 million RMB (over $8 million USD) and received 40 million RMB of the settlement. King Semi is a spinout from the Shenyang Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences and specializes in semiconductor fabrication equipment founded in 2002. The company that misappropriated the trade secrets was founded by former …
China to Add Statement of Use Requirement for Trademarks?
In the Letter of the China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) in Reply to Recommendation No. 2505 of the Fifth Session of the Thirteenth National People’s Congress, CNIPA proposed to require a filing of a statement of use in trademark applications. CNIPA would be able to revoke trademarks ex-officio for failure to use.