The uniqueness of the utility model patent system in China lies in its readiness to obtain, and its strong enforcement. Utility models have many advantages in acquiring rights. For example, the cost of applying for a utility model patent is remarkably lower than that of an invention patent; and the prosecution term of a utility model is very short – a UM application can usually be granted within one year with more than 80% of granting rate. A utility model patent also has a lower inventiveness requirement than that of an invention. Facing the same prior art, an invention patent may be invalidated while a utility model with the same claims may be maintained.

With respect to enforcement, the patentee of a UM patent is entitled to file an infringement lawsuit directly after issue of the patent.
According to the litigation system of China, even if the utility model patent is finally invalidated, and thus failed in the infringement case, the losing patentee does not need to compensate the loss of the winning defendant unless the patentee is proved to have sued in bad faith. In the present judicial practice in China, since the recognition of bad faith is very strict, only a few cases have determined that the plaintiff patentee sued in bad faith.
For the reasons mentioned above, and taking over two million UM patent applications that were filed in 2018 into consideration, a considerable amount of utility model patent applications are granted without substantive examination (inventiveness exam) and, in particular, independent claims of many utility model patents are unreasonably broad, even covering prior art. As such, manufacturing enterprises face high patent risks in their operations.

(Read more at VantageAsia)

“The study noted that the United States remains the world ‘patent superpower’, but East Asia has developed by ‘leaps and bounds’ in the last 10 years.”

Independent foundation Bertelsmann Stiftung published a study titled “World class patents in cutting-edge technologies – The innovation power of East Asia, North America and Europe,” which examined how individual countries have advanced in the development and filing of “world class patents” between 2000 and 2019.

While the study showed that North America and Europe have the highest patent efficiencies, it noted that East Asia has “exhibited an unparalleled inventive spirit” and has increased its innovation power in many cutting edge-technologies, such as energy, nutrition, infrastructure, industry and environment.

The United States is the world’s top innovation center “by far” and holds the largest number of world class patents, which cover 50 of the 58 technologies reviewed in the study.

The study noted concerns that Europe is falling behind because digitalization is progressing slowly in Europe “at a time when the fourth industrial revolution is about to fundamentally change the traditional forms of economic activity.”

Read more at IPWatchdog.

Agritech businesses will be considering how best to protect their rights following a recent ruling that plants and animals produced by traditional breeding methods cannot be patented. (Read more at Pinsent Masons)

Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) is a system of cooperation between patent offices. By agreement between the offices and on request of a patent applicant, the work product of one patent office that has already allowed the application or given a positive International Preliminary Report on Patentability (IPRP) (the Office of Earlier Examination "OEE") is used in the examination of the patent application of the same family in another patent office (the Office of Later Examination "OLE"), provided that the applicant presents only the allowable claims in the OLE application.

The idea of using solar panels to give electric cars a little extra boost is nothing new. In fact, the 2020 Hyundai Sonata Hybrid has a solar roof that helps to run its electronics, and can give it a couple of extra miles of driving range each day. Solar panels aren’t efficient enough at this point to fully charge up an electric car, but the more surface area a solar panel takes up, the more energy it can capture. If you could have a car completely covered with solar panels, it might produce a few more miles a day worth of power, if not more. Recently, Ford Global Technologies filed a patent application for a unique kind of solar charging panel that basically blankets a car when parked. (Read more)

Patents on plants and animals derived from conventional breeding can be fully prohibited in Europe. This is the result of a verdict published by the Enlarged Board of Appeal, the highest legal body of the European Patent Office (EPO). (Article in EUBusiness)

After VOIP-Pal filed near-simultaneous lawsuits against tech giants Facebook, Amazon, Apple, and Google, Twitter has turned the tables, filing a complaint for declaratory judgment against VOIP-Pal. They argued that the claims made in the new suits are similar to a previous case, which VOIP-Pal lost. Twitter has requested a declaratory judgment of noninfringement in relation to U.S. Patent No. 10,218,606. Twitter states that the patent is “a member of a family that includes six other patents that VOIP-Pal has asserted in prior lawsuits in this Court against Twitter, Apple, AT&T, Verizon Wireless and Amazon (‘first and second wave actions’). The patent shares a common specification with the six previously-asserted patents. All six of the previously-asserted patents were found to be invalid for claiming ineligible subject matter.”