In the first half of this year, the State Intellectual Property Office accepted 33,000 PCT international patent applications submitted by domestic applicants, an increase of 7.1%, and 3,024 applications for international registration of Madrid trademarks, an increase of 12.0%. Since joining the Hague Agreement in May 2022, Chinese applicants have submitted more than 150 international design applications per month, ranking among the top in the world. The reporter learned from the press conference on intellectual property work in the first half of 2023 held by The State Council Information Office that since the beginning of this year, the State Intellectual Property Office has played an active role in the process of escorting enterprises to "go global", and Chinese applicants have been more active in applying for intellectual property rights abroad.

"One net" escorts overseas rights protection

With the acceleration of the pace of domestic enterprises "going out", the intellectual property disputes they encounter are gradually increasing. According to statistics, in the past year, the number of intellectual property litigation cases of Chinese enterprises in the United States, the number of enterprises involved in the litigation, and the number of Chinese enterprises involved in the "337 investigation" have all increased to varying degrees, which poses new challenges for Chinese enterprises to accelerate the improvement of foreign-related intellectual property protection capabilities.

In order to effectively protect the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese enterprises, in recent years, the State Intellectual Property Office, together with other relevant departments, has continued to strengthen the construction of the guidance mechanism for dealing with overseas intellectual property disputes, providing a strong guarantee for escorting enterprises to "go global".

At the press conference, Zhang Zhicheng, Director of the Intellectual Property Protection Department of the State Intellectual Property Office, introduced that in recent years, the State Intellectual Property Office has continued to optimize the overseas intellectual property dispute response guidance network, and ensure the effective operation of the national overseas intellectual property dispute response guidance center and local sub-centers. Each center provides proactive and front-line services to effectively help enterprises enhance their awareness and ability of overseas intellectual property protection. Up to now, 43 local sub-centers have been built across the country, covering 27 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government).

The service network is becoming more and more dense, and the confidence of enterprises to take the initiative to protect their rights overseas is becoming more and more sufficient. According to statistics, from 2021 to 2022, Chinese enterprises involved in the "337 investigation" final judgment 213 times, of which the proportion of the dominant judgment (including termination of the investigation, withdrawal of the plaintiff, ruling of non-infringement, etc.) reached more than 60%, more than twice that of 2020.

"One-Stop Service for Enterprises Going Overseas

In recent years, China's overseas intellectual property rights protection and assistance mechanism has been constantly innovated to provide high-level, specialized, public welfare guidance services to help enterprises reduce the cost of overseas intellectual property rights protection, and positive progress has been made in many aspects.

In terms of improving the risk prevention and control system of foreign-related intellectual property rights, the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) monitors the information on patent disputes in the U.S., 337 investigations and other key areas of disputes in a timely manner, and strengthens the early warning. This year, in view of the high incidence of overseas intellectual property disputes in key industries, the State Intellectual Property Office has carried out guidance on overseas intellectual property disputes in the information and communication and biomedical industries, which has effectively enhanced the risk response capability of the relevant enterprises.

At the same time, the State Intellectual Property Office continues to increase the supply of overseas intellectual property information, optimize information service platforms such as "Zhinanpin.com" and increase the interconnection and sharing of information results of local platforms; increase the publicity and interpretation of the guidelines on intellectual property protection for cross-border e-commerce, country-specific guidelines, and guidelines on overseas trademark protection for key countries, and continue to strengthen the supply of information of various types. Information supply.

Various localities are also continuously strengthening their efforts in overseas rights protection and assistance, taking multiple measures and making key breakthroughs, forming a favorable situation in which local practices have blossomed everywhere. For example, Guangdong has taken the lead in promoting the effective implementation of overseas intellectual property infringement liability insurance service system; Hebei Provincial Intellectual Property Office has guided Shijiazhuang, Handan and other municipal bureaus to establish an early warning platform for overseas intellectual property rights protection, helping enterprises to obtain the results of patent retrieval and analysis and the industry's development trend in a timely manner, and so on.

Zhang Zhicheng said, the next step, the State Intellectual Property Office will continue to strengthen the protection of intellectual property rights overseas, in order to help enterprises to "go out" and promote high-quality development escort.