Courts
Patent Inventiveness in China: Why “Common Knowledge” Must Be Proven, Not Assumed
14 August 2026A Case Study of the "Electronic Blackboard" Case, (2025) SPC Zhi Xing Zhong No. 286 I. Introduction In assessing inventive step for invention patents, determining whether a technical solution would have been “readily conceivable” to a person skilled in the art has long been one of the most disputed and uncertain aspects of the analysis. […]
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Is “Comparable” the New “Unexpected”? China’s SPC Relaxes Inventive Step Standard for Breakthrough Therapeutics
14 July 2026How the Supreme People's Court Established a New Benchmark for Unexpected Technical Effects in a Landmark Diabetic Nephropathy Case Proving inventive step for pharmaceutical compounds, especially a second medical use, remains one of the most challenging aspects of patent prosecution in China. When the prior art discloses a compound's general therapeutic properties, how can an […]
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IP Update: China’s Supreme People’s Court Issues First Public Decision Defining China’s Inventorship Standard
1 June 2026In theory China's inventorship standard is similar to others around the world. An inventor is anyone who "makes creative contributions to the substantive features" of an invention. But what does this mean, and how does one apply this standard? Up to this point, this issue hasn't really been litigated much in China (at least according […]
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AI is magical but NOT magic! Be specific in your AI patents!
9 January 2025What is the standard of sufficient disclosure for AI-related patents: A case study in China The rapid growth of AI patent applications present significant challenges to existing patent application and examination practices. One of them is satisfying the requirement for sufficient disclosure. The following case was featured in the 2023 CNIPA Compilation of Key Decisions […]
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How a Secondhand Ground Brush Wiped Away a Chinese Patent
4 December 2024A Chinese robot vacuum company digs up “hidden evidence” to successfully invalidate a patent owned by its biggest competitor. Highlights Background With the growth of online shopping, it is easier than ever to provide evidence of a sale when the product is still being sold on the market. But what if the product is no […]
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Beijing IP Court Reverses CNIPA Decision and Upholds Ozempic® semaglutide patent in China as VALID based on Novo Nordisk’s Post Filing Data
27 June 2024Recently, all eyes have been on China as the fundamental patent covering semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic® and Wegovy®, will expire on March 20, 2026. It goes without saying that generics are ramping up bigtime in China (and also around the world), preparing to manufacture and sell this blockbuster drug to one of the […]
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Twice the Trouble: Unraveling a Single Case of Dual Patent and Trademark Infringement
9 January 2024Can a rights holder sue the same infringer separately based on one single infringing act that infringes both trademark and patent rights? An interesting case this year from China’s Supreme People’s Court that addresses this specific issue ((2023)最高法知民终235号). Beijing Run De Hong Tu Technology Development Co., Ltd. (“Run De Hong Tu”) sued an individual named […]
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Do Promotional Marketing Materials Constitute an “Offer for Sale” under Chinese Patent Law? Bayer IP GmbH v. Nanjing Hang Seng Pharmaceutical
12 December 2023Bayer's blockbuster drug Rivaroxaban has seen its share of patent litigations in China, several of which are big enough to be listed as Top 10 IP cases or 50 Representative IP cases. We summarized an invalidation case back in 2020 where all of Bayer’s claims directed towards the compound were upheld. Recently, another Rivaroxaban case […]
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First ever Invalidation decision on an RNAi Invention patent in China
4 December 2023Decision on Examination of Request for Invalidation (No. 58530) In one of China’s Top 10 Patent Re-examination / Invalidation cases of 2022, an invalidation decision on a patent claiming Hepatitis B Virus (HBV) RNAi compositions (No. 58530) by the Patent Re-examination Board (the “Board”) sheds light on the standard for post filing data for rejections […]
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Inventive Step for an Enantiomer over a Racemate: “L-ornidazole” Patent Invalidation Case
27 November 2023Each year, China’s Supreme People’s Court (SPC) issues its annual “Judgment Digests”, which includes a list of “48 typical cases” highlighting representative SPC decisions in the previous year. The Judgment Digests help us understand more about the SPC’s judicial ideology, trial concepts, and adjudication methods in dealing with difficult and sophisticated legal issues as well […]
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