Foreign-related Cases Accepted at Beijing IP Court See Continual Growth Since Inauguration
During the China Forum on International Legal Cooperation held on 10 November 2019 in Guangzhou, Judge Chen Jinchuan, vice president of Beijing Intellectual Property Court (BIPC), provided an overview of the adjudication of foreign-related IP cases heard by BIPC since its inauguration in 2014.
As noted by Judge Chen, from November 2014 until the end of the first half of 2019, 13,736 cases accepted by the court were foreign-related, accounting for 21.1% of the total cases accepted, and an average annual growth rate of 8.4% was seen over the four-and-a-half year period. By case type, 13,164 cases accepted, or 95.8% of the total, were administrative cases, of which 91.8% related to trademark and 8.2% to patent; and 572 were civil cases, with nearly 50% of which relating to patent, and the rest to trademark, copyright or unfair competition.
During the period, 10,755 cases concluded by BIPC were foreign-related, representing 20.7% of the total and seeing an average growth rate of 40.4%. These cases spanned 90 countries and regions (excluding Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan), with 33.2% from the US, 10.3% from Germany, and 8.8% from Japan.
Regarding the success rate of foreign parties, their winning rate in administrative IP cases (excluding cases where both the plaintiff and the third party are foreigners) and in civil IP cases (excluding cases where both the plaintiff and the defendant are foreigners) handled by BIPC during the period was 49% and 68% respectively.
In terms of damages, the amount claimed by the foreign party in civil cases handled by BIPC during the period averaged around RMB2.77 million, while damages awarded by the court were about RMB1.36 million on average. As for technical IP cases that involve patent, software copyright, new plant species or trade secret, the amount claimed by the foreign party during the period averaged around RMB2.38 million, and the damages awarded by the court were about RMB2.08 million on average.
