Patent Law

The following is excerpted from Stan Abrams April 29, 2010 post at his China Hearsay blog:

Every once in a while, a big intellectual property case comes along in China that makes the foreign investment community sit up and take notice. In order to receive a lot of attention, you need the following:

1. The case is in a China People?s Court. Even better if a Chinese plaintiff sues in a foreign court.
2. One of the litigants is a foreign company. Even better, the foreign company is the defendant, which is rare.
3. Damages are high.
4. One or both of the litigants is a famous multinational.
5. The verdict results in a foreign company having to pay a license fee to a Chinese company or discontinue production.

This Monday, eyebrows were raised as a large Chinese electronics firm filed suits against two foreign multinationals, and hinted at additional cases against other enterprises, using a patent infringement theory.

Aigo, a Chinese consumer electronics giant of Beijing Huaqi Information Digital Technology Co Ltd., is suing Hewlett-Packard (HP) and Toshiba of infringing on its six patents for USB Plus, a storage port technology used in many laptop computers, according to reports Monday.

Read the full post here.