China to spearhead more international rules on IP protection

China will take initiative to participate in formulating and amending more international rules involving intellectual property to better serve the country's opening-up, a senior IP regulator said.

"We'll continue our deep participation in improving international rules on patents, trademarks, industrial designs and geographical indications under the multilateral framework, with global exchanges on the review rules in fields of emerging technology," said Shen Changyu, commissioner of the China National Intellectual Property Administration.

He made the remark on Friday when delivering a report on summarizing last year's achievements and introducing this year's major work to sub-bureaus of intellectual property nationwide.

He said the administration will strengthen IP cooperation on the Belt and Road Initiative, with greater efforts paid in promoting multilateral cooperation, such as those with BRICS countries and ASEAN nations.

"We'll also support industrial associations and social organizations to take part in IP-related international exchanges," he added.

Looking back at last year's work, he lauded the fight against improper registration of trademarks, saying "it helped improve high-quality development in IP-related fields."

According to him, the administration rejected malicious registration of 3,192 trademarks, including those on La'eeb, mascot of FIFA World Cup in Qatar, and Bing DwenDwen, mascot of the Beijing Winter Olympics.

It also restricted the transfer of 3,522 trademarks suspected of malicious squatting, and announced 2,629 trademarks invalid, he said.

"The fight has sent a signal that our review on IP applications has always been strict, as we hope to contribute to making the industrial environment better," he added.

To continuously provide stronger support for building an innovative business environment, he said the administration also shortened the time for reviewing IP applications.

For example, the average time for reviewing trademark applications was reduced to four months in 2022 from 10 months in previous years, and the period for reviewing invention patent applications was also shortened to 16.5 months in 2022 from 22.6 months in 2012, he added.

In addition, the administration strengthened the supervision on IP service providers, urging them to promote the self-discipline, he said.

Data from the report showed that the administration summoned 7,400 IP agencies after finding problems last year, ordering 4,500 of them to rectify the issues. Under the stronger oversight, 19 agencies were required to stop businesses and their service qualifications were revoked.