Top 10 Typical Technology-related IP Cases of the Intellectual Property Court of the Supreme People’s Court in 2020
[Disclaimer: below is a brief English introduction of the selected SPC judgments of the technology-related IP cases heard by the IPC in 2020. In case of any discrepancy between the original judgments in Chinese and its English summary, the original judgments in Chinese shall prevail. For the full version of these judgments in Chinese, please visit China Judgments Online, i.e. wenshu.court.gov.cn]
1. Anti-suit Injunction Issued in Three Cases Concerning Standard Essential Patents on Wireless Communication
Case No.: (2019) SPC IP Civil Final 732 / 733 / 734
Case Facts
In January 2018, Huawei filed a case with Nanjing Intermediate People’s Court, requesting judicial declaration that Huawei had not infringed three of Conversant’s Chinese patents and also requesting judicial determination on royalty rates of the standard essential patents (SEPs) in China. To counteract Huawei’s lawsuit, Conversant filed a patent infringement lawsuit in the court of Düsseldorf, Germany in April 2018, requesting the German court to order Huawei to cease the alleged infringement and compensate for alleged losses. On September 16th, 2019 Nanjing Intermediate People’s Court rendered its first instance judgment, determining the royalty rates of Conversant’s SEPs involved in the case for Huawei plus its Chinese affiliates. Conversant appealed against the first instance judgment to the SPC. On August 27th, 2020 when the appellant case was still in the litigation process at the SPC, the German court rendered its first instance judgment according to which Huawei and its German affiliates had infringed Conversant’s European patents, and Huawei plus its German affiliates should cease to provide, sell, use, import, or hold relevant mobile terminals for the afore-mentioned purposes, and should destroy or recall the infringing products. The German court judgment could have been enforced in advance since Conversant provided a monetary security in the amount of €2.4 million. On the same day, Huawei applied to the SPC for an injunction, requesting that Conversant be prohibited from applying for enforcement of the German court judgment prior to the rendering of the SPC’s final judgment. On the basis of the doctrine of international judicial practice and in light of the balancing factors such as necessity, profits and losses, the Intellectual Property Court (the IPC) of the SPC, without any delay, issued an anti-suit injunction within 48 hours, ordering that Conversant should not apply for enforcement of the said German court judgment prior to the rendering of the SPC’s final judgment, in violation of which, a daily fine of RMB one million should be imposed on Conversant and such fine shall accrue on a daily basis if the violation continues. Conversant petitioned against the anti-suit injunction. The petition was then rejected by the IPC after a court hearing. While fully respecting and implementing the ruling on anti-suit injunction afterwards, the parties to the cases held business negotiations in an active manner and then reached a global package-settlement agreement ending all transnational parallel litigations over the globe. It is fair to say that the anti-suit injunction ruling in this case has achieved sound effects from both legal and social perspectives.
Case Significance
In these three lawsuits, the IPC for the first time issued its anti-suit injunction in the field of intellectual property and took the daily-fine measure to ensure the enforcement of such injunction. The IPC in these three cases pointed out the conditions and factors to be considered for issuing anti-suit injunction which by its nature falls within the category of act preservation. The judicial practice of the IPC in these cases may also help improve China’s anti-suit injunction mechanism and protect the legitimate rights and interests of the parties.
