China's State Intellectual Property Office Issues New Patent Fee Standards to Take Effect July 1

The State Intellectual Property Office has announced a change in official fees which will come into effect on July 1, 2017. Whilst many fees remain at the same level, the issue fee for invention patents has decreased from RMB255 (US$37) to RMB200 (US$29), that for utility model patents has decreased from RMB205 (US$30) to RMB150 (US$22) and that for design patents has also decreased from RMB205 to RMB150. There is also an additional patent printing fee of RMB50 (US$7).

Copies of any patent documents (including copies of the statement of registration, priority application copies, a copy of the patent certificate, proof of patent certificate, proof of patent registration, proof of grant process and proof of change to applicant's name)  are now charged at RMB30 (US$4.40) per copy, whereas no fee was previously listed.

With regards to the PCT stage, the fee for a request to recover patent rights is now listed as RMB1000 (US$147).

Entering the national phase in China, the fee for recovering priority rights is now listed as RMB1000, whereas it was previously RMB300 (US$44).

The fee for requesting reexamination of layout design registration has also been adjusted from RMB300 to RMB2000 (US$293).

IP Offices of Japan, Korea and China Compare Invalidation Procedure in Report

The Japan Patent Office (JPO), the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) and China's State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) have jointly published a new report titled, 'A Comparative Study on the Patent Trial for Invalidation among JPO, KIPO and SIPO.' The report is available on the JPO website which you can access by clicking the link below.

The report was carried out by the Joint Experts Group of Trial and Appeal (JEGTA), first formed in 2013.

You can access the report in pdf format by clicking here.

Gree Electric Appliances Seeks US$16 million in Patent Damages from Domestic Rival

After Zhuhai-based domestic appliance firm Gree Electric Appliances Inc filed suit in Beijing against domestic rivals air conditioning firms Midea and AUX for infringing a patent, Midea has retaliated by launching three patent infringement suits in Suzhou and Guangzhou, seeking compensation of RMB40 million (US$5.9 million) . In the Beijing suits Gree is said to be seeking compensation of RMB50 million (US$7.3m) from Midea and RMB110 million (US$16m) from AUX, a record high in the country.

This is the 15th time AUX has been on the receiving end of patent infringement litigation filed by Gree Electric Appliances in the period from 2015-2017, according to XCN News. The company was previously judged to have infringed a Midea patent by the Guangdong High People's Court on final instance and was ordered to pay damages and costs amounting to RMB1 million (US$147,000), according to the media outlet.

Li Keqiang Responds to EU Chamber of Commerce Criticism at Summer DAVOS

After China faced criticism from the European Union Chamber of Commerce at the beginning of this year for allegedly demanding technology transfers to Chinese parties as the price of entry to the Chinese market for foreign firms, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang stated yesterday that the Chinese government does not permit Chinese companies to force foreign firms into technology transfer, nor does it allow them to infringe on intellectual property rights, according to state-owned news agency Xinhua.

Li made the comments to an audience of business people at the 2017 Summer Davos Forum in Dalian, Liaoning Province, in response to criticism of the ‘Made in China 2025’ strategy, adding that the strategy is aimed at improving the quality of Chinese products and equipment, but does not mean that China will have no need to buy equipment from overseas in the future, the agency reported.

He said that Chinese manufacturing equipment was of a lower standard than average Chinese manufactured products, and so China still needs to bring a large amount of equipment in from overseas in the process of Made in China 2025, which inevitably means foreign and Chinese firms cooperating on equipment technology, according to the report.

He added that joint ventures between foreign and Chinese firms will help in the localization of products, and that such ventures are entered into willingly, and benefit the foreign companies by allowing them to open up the Chinese market and third-party markets, the report stated.

At the beginning of 2017, the Beijing-based European Union Chamber of Commerce published a report titled ‘China Manufacturing 2025: Putting Industrial Policy Ahead of Market Forces’, criticizing China’s industrial policy and suggesting that foreign electric car manufacturers were feeling pressured by China to transfer technology to their Chinese partners in exchange for being able to manufacture and sell in China.

China and Egypt Launch Pilot Patent Prosecution Highway

A pilot patent prosecution highway (PPH) between China and Egypt will begin on July 1, 2017. The pilot scheme will last for two years until June 30, 2019. 

Patent prosecution highways are agreements in which intellectual property offices agree to share certain information with each other to expedite patent applications based on counterpart applications in the first office of application.

Taiwan's Mobile Devices Output Drops in Q1 of 2017

Taiwan's Market Intelligence & Consulting Institute predicted earlier this month that Taiwan's communications output value for 2017 would reach NT$2.96 trillion (US$434 billion), down 4% from 2016, with output slipping under the NT$3 trillion mark. Around 60% of output in Taiwan's communications sector comes from mobile devices, comprising mainly of smartphones, however, in the first quarter of 2017 alone, smartphone shipments slipped by 35.5%, so even if there is a surge in production of domestic phones and the new generation of iPhone in the second quarter, the lack of momentum will make any rise in the communication sector difficult.

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