According to the data from State Intellectual Property Office of China (SIPO), China dealt 24,479 patent administrative enforcement cases in 2014, which was the first time for China dealing over 20,000 patent administrative enforcement cases per year. Among them, 8,220 cases were patent dispute cases, with a year-on-year growth of 62.6%; 16,259 were counterfeiting patent cases, with a year-on-year growth of 45.5%. "We need to strengthen legislation in key areas, and quickly improve legal systems that ensure equal rights and interests, equal opportunities, and fair rules for all." in the Fourth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee, China decided to improve intellectual property and strengthen the protection of intellectual property. Industry experts believe that, China strengthened intellectual property administrative enforcement to contribute to build a powerful intellectual property nation in 2014, making itself a better legal and marketing environment.

An officer of Patent Affairs Administration Department under SIPO told the reporter that, compared with 2013, China's intellectual property administrative enforcement had many new characteristics in 2014, such as enforcement were strengthened in every region, the structure of cases dealing were renewed, cases about invention patents were increasing, dispute cases involving foreign subjects were increasing, etc.

According to the officer, in 2014, 6 provinces in China separately dealt over 1,000 cases, which were 3,681 in Jiangsu, 3,505 in Zhejiang, 2,815 in Hunan, 2,555 in Guangdong, 2,542 in Shandong and 1,078 in Henan. Classified in region, eastern and central China each dealt 11,551 and 4,843 cases in 2014, totally made 67% in the whole nation; while eastern and north China increased more, with year-on-year growth of 89.5% and 76.9%. Besides, nearly half of the 31 provinces dealt over 100 infringement dispute cases, of them Zhejiang, Guangdong, Jiangsu, Shandong and Henan dealt over 200 infringement dispute cases.

In 2014, the amount of counterfeiting patent cases dealt in China was 1.98 times of the amount of patent dispute cases, which was less than the proportion of 2.21:1 in 2013. The number of patent dispute cases' increasing shows China is improving its capability of handling cases. There has been a special outpouring of concern that, in the 8,220 patent dispute cases dealt in 2014, 1,239 were invention patent cases, taking 15.1% of the total, up 4% than the last year.

Meanwhile, China dealt more cases involving foreign subjects. In 2014, China dealt 521 cases involving foreign subjects, taking 6.8% of the total 7,617 patent infringement dispute cases, up 43.9%.

"These data shows that the innovators and patentees have more requirements of legal protection, and their confidence in China's administrative enforcement is improving." Said an expert. The expert expressed that, China should undertake further work on intellectual property protection in the future, and strengthen intellectual property administrative enforcement to protect the rights of patentees, making the market environment more legal, fair and open, contributing to build a powerful intellectual property country.

(Source: China IP News)