Washington, D.C., partner Phong Nguyen authored an article, "Changing Landscape: Introduction to the Third Amendment to the Chinese Patent Law," which appeared in the July 2, 2009, ABA Business Law Section eNewsletter.
According to Nguyen, "China's patent law is rapidly evolving to keep pace with its constantly expanding economy. On December 27, 2008, the Standing Committee of the Eleventh National People's Congress—China's top legislature—approved the Third Amendment of the Chinese Patent Law. The Third Amendment will go into full effect on October 1, 2009. These changes will have profound effect on global industries and innovative Chinese companies that expect to obtain and enforce patents in China."
To help foreign businesses and practitioners stay on top of the new laws, Nguyen's article goes on to outline the major changes, including:
Nguyen concludes: "The Third Amendment will change the way foreign companies obtain patent protection and conduct business in China. With the new absolute novelty standard, it is advisable to file a patent application before any disclosure. It is also advisable to submit the application to a confidential examination by the SIPO before it is filed anywhere in the world particularly if there is at least one Chinese inventor. Inventions involving genetic materials require a disclosure of its source which a practitioner should consider before filing the application. Foreign companies should consider filing both an invention patent and the utility model on the same day in order to maximize patent protection for their products. When a foreign company is developing a product with a Chinese company, the foreign company should have an agreement in place to have any intellectual property developed by the Chinese company assigned to the foreign company."
To read the full article, from the ABA website, click here.