Fast-changing intellectual property landscape
China always gets the blame for failing to protect intellectual property rights. Now, as it speeds towards becoming an innovation-based economy, its intellectual property (IP) landscape is also changing.
For years, Washington has lambasted Beijing over piracy. In 2007, it requested that the World Trade Organisation establish a dispute resolution panel to handle cases of IP rights violation on the mainland.
Last year, China showed the world its determination to knock out the knock-offs!
The Chinese Patent Office issued 580,000 patents, up 41 per cent from a year earlier, and almost six times that of 2001.
In 2008 it surpassed the US to become the most litigious country for IP disputes with 24,000 suits filed. That compares to more than 9,500 cases filed in the US in the same year. New patent applications in China totalled 947,000 last year, up from 252,000 in 2002.