IP Tribunal of Chinese Supreme Court Releases Case Adjudication Status at Second Anniversary & Announces Ten Exemplary Cases 2020
On 26 February 2021, the Intellectual Property Tribunal (the "IP Tribunal") of the Supreme People's Court of China (the "SPC") held a press conference to brief on the adjudication work achieved by the tribunal during the past two years since its inception on 1 January 2019, as well as announced the 10 Exemplary Technological IP Cases of 2020.
As noted by its deputy chief judge He Zhonglin, the IP Tribunal has contributed to the effective consistency of the standard for adjudication of technological IP appeal cases in the country, by centrally taking up the hearing of these cases that used to be spread over 32 local high courts.
The IP Tribunal has also helped enhance the quality and efficiency of the trial of IP cases. During the past two years, a total of 5,121 cases were accepted, and 4,220 cases concluded, representing a closing rate of 82%. Of the cases concluded, 2,787 were closed in 2020, compared to 1,354 in 2019, a year-on-year increase of about 95%. Additionally, to keep the trial work going during the COVID-19 epidemic in 2020, 1,000-plus online trials were held by the IP Tribunal.
In terms of trial cycle, the IP Tribunal achieved an average of 123 days for substantive cases of second instance. Specifically, the average for civil cases was 121.5 days and that for administrative cases 130.7 days, an obvious improvement to the average trial cycle of 1 year of the local high courts before the establishment of the IP Tribunal.
Also released during the press briefing were the Ten Exemplary Technological IP Cases 2020. The ten cases selected this year included civil, administrative, as well as interlocked civil and administrative cases, involving both formality and substantive issues and relating to different areas of IP such as patent, computer software, trade secret, integrated circuit layout design, or anti-monopoly.
A case worth noting among these exemplary cases is a trade secret case first imposed with punitive damages by the SPC. In this case, the highest punitive damages, i.e., 5 times of the amount determined according to the statutory provisions, amounting to RMB 30 million, were applied, on the basis of such factors as subjective malice, impediment of proof, and continuous infringement.
