Recently, Supreme People’s Court of PRC(SPC) published eight typical cases of judicial protection on intellectual property of 2013 in Beijing, including six civil cases and two criminal cases. The cases highlight some important new trends in judicial trial be the court and case guidance on IPR protection in China. The summary and analysis of the cases are as follows:
1. Applicants Eli Lilly and Company, Lilly (China) R & D Co., Ltd. vs Huang Mengwei: The applicants succeeded in requesting the Court’s permission for preserving the defendant Huang Mengwei’s behavior. After the amendment of the Civil Procedural Law, this is the topic behavior preservation case of its kind, where the defendant’s behavior was preserved to prove infringement of trade secret.
2. Foshan Haitian Flavoring & Food Co., Ltd. vs Foshan Gaoming Weiji Flavoring & Food Co., Ltd. for trademark infringement and unfair competition. When hear the case although the plaintiff failed to prove direct losses, the Court held the infringer should compensate for damage closer to the actual losses of the trademark owner, change the company name and eliminate negative effect of the infringement to minimize the plaintiff’s loss. In addition, the case seems to cause high social attention and related to consumer harm.
3. BMW AG vs Guangzhou Shiji Baochi Clothing Co., Ltd. for trademark infringement and unfair competition. According to Article 56 of the PRC Trademark Law, when the exact amount of the infringer’s benefits derived from the infringement and that of the loss caused by such infringement are hard to determine, the current maximum of the compensation to the trademark owner is 500,000 RMB. However, in the BMW case, the Beijing High People’s Court determined an award of 2,000,000 RMB for infringement damages due to the infringer’s subjective malicious violation, the length of time and huge benefit from the infringement.
4. Zhuhai Gree Electric Appliances Inc. vs Guangdong Midea Refrigeration Equipment Co., Ltd., for invention patent infringement. In this case, both parties are famous Chinese electrical appliance enterprises. Gree claimed that the technological solutions applied in four types of Midea air conditioners infringed its invention patent. However, the defendant failed to distinguish the remaining products with the infringed one. The Guangdong High People’s Court held the remaining three types of Midea products to be infringed based on reasonable presumption.
5 Ashland Licensing and Intellectual Property Limited, Beijing Angel Chemical Technology Co., Ltd. vs Beijing Rui Shibang Fine Chemical Technology Co., Ltd., Suzhou Ruipu Industrial Additives Ltd., and Wei Xingguang for manufacturing process. In this case, the patented manufacturing process is a difficulty for infringement determination. Suzhou Intermediate People’s Court determined the case based on a burden of proof reversal.
6. Beijing Ruibangyonghe Trade Co., Ltd. vs Johnson & Johnson (Shanghai) Medical Equipment Co., Ltd., Johnson & Johnson (China) Medical Equipment Co., for vertical monopoly agreements dispute, which become the first and a landmark in preventing monopoly disputes in China.
7. Jiangxi Yibo Electronic Technology Co., Ltd., Yu Zhihong and others accused for criminal trade secret infringement. A penalty of 37 million made this case the largest business information trade secret criminal case in China, and a sample of harsher punishment in this area. Moreover, the case was also marked as a model for Guangdong province’s “three tribunals in one” trial model, where civil, administrative and criminal IP jurisdiction are combined.
8. Zong Liangui and Huang Li’an and 26 other individual defendants accused for criminal trademark counterfeiting. The case highlights the importance of punishment in criminal IP cases, as well as the effectiveness of the combined civil, criminal and administrative IP tribunals in the court.
