Jun 4 movement 22 years ago

22 years ago, the call for democracy was met with tanks and guns. 22 years later, there are a few demonstrators still in jail and a large number of them denied the right to go back to China.

A moment of silence for those who lost their life 22 years ago, and the call for the release of Ai Wei Wei, Liu Xiao Bo and many others who are jailed or illegal detained throughout China.

Summer promotion by China Intellectual Property HK Limited

Our company is running a promotion this summer. We charge a flat fee for filing patent of invention application to State Intellectual Property Office of China for US$3,000 per application (translation, drafting and examination fee excluded). This fee also include claiming of foreign priority and condition applies.

Our company is also giving away free iPad2 (32G Wifi) for any inventor or foreign patent agent who fill 3 patent applications through us by 30 Sep 2011. To qualify, you must confirm and approve the final draft of patent application suitable for filing to State Intellectual Property Office of China and pay up cost on account before 23 Sep 2011.

Note: The US$3,000 fee represents a standard application process and handle patent of invention only. The fee does not include translation of patent application in your language into Chinese, and possible redrafting of patent application suitable for filing in China, and cost of draftsman work on patent drawing. Examination fee is not paid at time of filing and is not included in the US$3,000 quoted fee. Applicant is required to provide foreign priority certificate and courier to our office.

Hong Kong Patent Attorney

There are professionals in Hong Kong trying to push for certification of patent attorney / patent agent. That will be an important move for intellectual protection in Hong Kong.

File a patent in China and claim a Taiwan priority

No matter what was said in the past, if you have first filed a patent in Taiwan (Republic of China), within 12-months' time, you want to file the same patent in China, you cannot claim the priority date of the Taiwan application.

Starting from 22 Nov 2010, you can do that (with a small but).

On 12 Sep 2010, China and Taiwan had agreed to accept and recoginize each other's priority certificate. So for a patent application first filed to Taiwan patent office on or after 12 Sep 2010, the same application can be filed to China patent office after 22 Nov 2010 and claim the priority date of the Taiwan application. When filling in the proper forms, it should state that the first filing office is "Taiwan Region", not Republic of China.

It is good to know that, though two patent offices required filing in Chinese, but in Taiwan, you need to file in Traditional Chinese, while in China, you need Simplified Chinese. And apart from character translation, the use of technical terms are different. Some type of redrafting is required between the two versions.

China prepare to put in more effort to protect IP rights of foreign enterprise

In a news announcement made on 8th November 2010, Chinese authority reinstate it's effort to protect IP rights of foreign enterprises.

A meeting was held in Chongqing City (重庆) on 7th November 2010 on the subject matter. The head of State Intellectual Property Office said that 100 or more policy had been rolled out annually in the last 5 years.

It was felt that China has developed leading edge technology in some of the fields, including energy, high speed train and information technology, as a nation, China should have interest in protecting itself in the IP area.

I hope foreign enterprises really had felt the effect in the past 5 years and give hope in the coming years. However, it is still not an easy task to deal with local authority, including the court and custom office with issues related to IP, not to mention when you have to deal with local administrative officials if there is a factory making infringement goods.

The Chinese news announcement can be found here.