On November 9, the Supreme People's Court held a press conference and issued the "Opinions of the Supreme People's Court on Supporting and Guaranteeing Shenzhen's Construction of a Pilot Demonstration Zone for Socialism with Chinese Characteristics." Gong Jiali, president of the Guangdong Higher People's Court, said that in the next step, under the guidance of the Supreme People's Court, we will accelerate the promotion of new types of intellectual property legal protection trials.
Gong was asked that “the "Opinions" issued by the Supreme Court clearly stated that the protection of intellectual property rights should be strengthened. President Gong also mentioned that Guangdong should build an international intellectual property protection highland. What are the specific measures?”
Gong Jiali replied that Guangdong is a major economic province and a major innovation province. The market is very dynamic and there are many economic disputes. For example, the number of intellectual property cases accounted for about one-third of the country. From January to October this year, 165,000 new cases were received, of which Shenzhen exceeded 60,000, many of which were new types of patent cases. In accordance with the requirements of "implementing the strictest judicial protection of intellectual property rights", we have taken the following measures.
First is to formulate rules for refereeing in key areas. The Guangdong Higher People's Court issued twelve opinions on strengthening judicial protection of intellectual property rights, which clearly stated that the judicial protection of intellectual property rights such as new generation information technology, biomedicine, artificial intelligence, high-end manufacturing, and well-known trademarks and time-honored brands should be strengthened. The Guangdong Higher People's Court first promulgated the guidelines for standard-essential patent adjudication and the guidelines for online game intellectual property adjudication, which have had a greater impact.
Second, is to increase the amount of compensation for infringement. Since 2019, the amount of compensation for patent infringement cases in Guangdong courts has increased by nearly 1.5 times, and there are more than 20 cases where the amount of compensation exceeds 10 million yuan, which has further increased the intensity of judicial punishment.
The third is to optimize the layout of trial resources. Give full play to the Guangzhou Intellectual Property Court to unify the province's (except Shenzhen) patent-related judgment standards, the Shenzhen Intellectual Property Court to strengthen the experience in exploring new types of cases, and the Guangzhou Internet Court to strengthen the experience in exploring network-related copyright disputes, and continue to accumulate and summarize the province New mechanisms, new measures, new cases and new experiences for judicial protection of intellectual property rights.
The fourth is to improve the efficiency of case trials. The Shenzhen and Guangzhou courts have repeatedly passed injunctions in recent years to stop infringements in a timely manner; they have adopted an expedited ruling mechanism for design patents and other cases, and the judgment rate in court exceeds 90%. The Guangzhou Internet Court uses the latest scientific and technological achievements such as 5G and blockchain to shorten the average trial period of cases to 35 days. At present, many multinational companies such as Apple, Qualcomm, Philip, Mitsubishi, Dyson, etc. have chosen Guangdong as the IP litigation venue.
Gong Jiali said that in the next step, under the guidance of the Supreme People’s Court, we will accelerate the promotion of new intellectual property legal protection pilots, promote the improvement of the technical investigator system, increase digital intellectual property research, and explore the transfer of the burden of proof in some intellectual property cases. The system fully supports Shenzhen to further create an optimal location for litigation of new types of intellectual property rights.
