Düsseldorf, 20.10.2014 – In the frame of a pilot project, three new courts in China will in the future exclusively deal with questions of intellectual property. This was decided by the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress on August 31, 2014. The IP-courts are to be established in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. Being intermediate people’s courts, they will primarily be responsible for technical IP trials and, as a ground idea, be trans-regionally active. With these new courts China aims at an intensified specialization in the field of intellectual property protection and ultimately at a higher level of legal security: The judges who will be operating will have great expertise in dealing with complex technology-related questions in the area of patents, plant variety right, integrated circuit layout design protection and company secrets.
The People’s Republic of China registered more than 80.000 adversary IP-proceedings in 2012, more than ten per cent of which were patent lawsuits. Most of the lawsuits in the area of intellectual property protection took so far place in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. In the eyes of Cohausz and Florack the choice of the respective venues for the new IP-courts is thus a logic conclusion. All in all, C&F welcomes the Chinese decision: “Establishing specialized IP-courts is an important step in order to master the large amount of intellectual property proceedings in China and to guarantee a safer and more effective protection of intellectual property”, says C&F patent attorney Mathias Karlhuber. “The German patent system, which in an international comparison is quite successful, will surely provide some good approaches for the further development in China.” However, it has not yet been decided upon as to when exactly the courts will begin their operations. Current plans are fo-cused on the end of 2014.
