Making full use of "multilateral and bilateral cooperation platforms", China is set to be better positioned in shaping the global intellectual property industry, said a senior official on Thursday.
"We will contribute more Chinese wisdom to international IP rules and promote their development toward 'general preference, inclusiveness, balance and effectiveness'," said ShenChangyu, commissioner of the State Intellectual Property Office.
SIPO hosted a meeting of senior officials from the world's five largest IP offices in China, the European Union, South Korea, Japan and the United States, collectively known as IP5, in May in Suzhou, Jiangsu province. They signed a joint statement at a meeting to cater to the needs of small businesses and individuals.
China is campaigning for the establishment of a cooperation mechanism among the world's five largest industrial design offices. It is also a member of the IP coordination group for emerging economies, including Brazil, Russia, India and South Africa.
China has made 171 IP agreements with 63 countries, regions and international organizations over the past five years. It has cooperated with 20 countries and regions in Patent Prosecution Highways, which speeds up the examination process for applications filed in IP offices.
As the country advances the Belt and Road Initiative proposed by President Xi Jinping in 2013,SIPO will further develop an IP information sharing platform involving countries along the route, conduct research into their IP environments and set up an exchange mechanism over the next five years, the commissioner said.
International applications from China filed through the Patent Cooperation Treaty jumped to117,000 during the 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-15), 2.2 times greater than the previous five-year period.
From 2011 to 2015, SIPO received more than 4 million invention patent applications and nearly 3million for industrial designs.
The marked growth is partially credited to an increasingly IP-friendly environment.
Government data shows that IP administrators across the country investigated 87,000 patent disputes over the past five years, nearly tenfold the total from the 11th Five-Year Plan (2006-10).
Authorities will continue their strict IP protection and increase their enforcement during the 13thFive-Year Plan (2016-20), Shen said.
"China's economy has entered the new normal, where the IP system is playing an increasingly important role in motivating innovation," he said, adding that the focus in IP work has begun to shift to quality from quantity by improving incentive policies and optimizing the IP evaluation system.
The efforts also include effective enforcement that will focus on major industries, overseas exhibitions and e-commerce, as well as industrial designs in textiles and garments, in the next five years, said Shen, who added that SIPO also plans to include information about IP infringements into the records of companies and individuals during the period.
(Source: China Daily)
