State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) released top 10 patent infringement/counterfeiting exemplary cases on July 19, 2018. These cases were handled by Chinese local IP offices and were commonly known as “patent administrative enforcement” in China.
Among the top 10 cases, one is related to E-commerce, which concerned the utility model patent infringement dispute on “top-speed wire pulling device” as handled by Intellectual Property Office of Zhejiang Province.
Facts
The complainant Guangxian YANG filed a utility model patent application entitled<top-speed wire="" pulling="" device="">with SIPO on October 8, 2015, and the application was granted on March 9, 2016 as Utility Model Patent No.: ZL2015207817282.2. YANG subsequently initiated a complaint in respect of patent infringement against 240 web-links spotted on the e-commerce platform of Alibaba. The evidence provided by YANG included patent certificate, patent evaluation report and preliminary analysis report on patent infringement with disassembled drawing of the accused product.</top-speed>
Action and Result
Intellectual Property Office (IPO) of Zhejiang Province entrusted Zhejiang Intellectual Property Right Assistance Center to assess whether the accused products infringed the patent. Based on the analytical materials provided by the complainant and technical information disclosed on the accused web-links, it was determined that the accused products fell into the scope of Claim 3 of the subject patent.
According to the complaint rules set by the E-commerce platform, if a patentee files a complaint, and if the accused product falls into the claim(s) of the patent (i.e., successful complaint), the E-commerce service provider shall notify the accused party, and the accused party can appeal within a certain period of time.
In this case, Alibaba platform notified the seller after the complaint was successful. All of the products involved in the above-mentioned web-links turned out to be infringing products even in view of the evidence provided by the seller during the appeal. Consequently, Alibaba timely took down all of the web-links on its website.
Significance
This case concretely demonstrated the cooperation between the patent enforcement by the local IP office and the assistance by the E-commerce service provider. Through such cooperation, the patent counterfeiting and patent infringement can be rapidly and effectively regulated, which permits a long-term patent enforcement in E-commerce platform. This constructs a positive market environment and promotes a healthy development of E-commerce in China.
The source of the article is from http://www.sipo.gov.cn/docs/20180720105506641329.pdf page 6.
