Recently, Beijing's No.1 Intermediate People's Court made the first instance decision for a patent infringement case in favor of Shanghai Zhizhen against Apple Computer Trading (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Apple Shanghai) and Apple Inc. by affirming the decision of the Patent Reexamination Board of SIPO.
In 2004, Shanghai Zhizhen Network Technology Co. (hereinafter referred to as Shanghai Zhizhen) filed a patent application for a voice-recognition system which was granted a Patent (ZL200410053749.9) in 2009.
In 2011, Apple Inc. released the voice recognition software named “Siri” applied in their new product iPhone4s. After careful comparative analysis, Shanghai Zhizhen held that Apple's “Siri”, as a smart network product, was suspected of infringing its patent (ZL200410053749.9).
In June 2012, Shanghai Zhizhen filed the lawsuit against Apple Shanghai and Apple Inc. before the Shanghai No.1 Intermediate People's Court for patent infringement.
In November 2012, Apple Shanghai reacted by requesting the Patent Reexamination Board of SIPO to invalidate Shanghai Zhizhen's patent (ZL200410053749.9) on the basis of insufficiency of technical disclosure and lack of inventiveness and novelty.
In September 2013, the Patent Reexamination Board of SIPO made the No. 21307 decision affirming the validity of the alleged patent. Apple Shanghai then appealed before Beijing's No.1 Intermediate People's Court which affirmed the decision of SIPO.
