Cities including Zhengzhou, Ningbo, and Wuhan Has Proposed to Establish the Next Intellectual Property Court in China

Recently, the "14th Five-Year Plan" Proposals have been released in various cities. Until now, Wuhan, Ningbo, Zhengzhou etc. have put forward the goal of establishing Intellectual Property Courts in the proposals.

The Plenary Session of the Zhengzhou Municipal Party Committee stated to “promote the establishment of Zhengzhou Intellectual Property Court”.

Zhengzhou has tried to promote the protection of intellectual property rights. On February 12, 2018, the Supreme People’s Court issued the "Approval to the Third Intermediate People's Court of Tianjin City and the Intermediate People's Courts of Zhengzhou, Changsha, and Xi'an to set up special adjudication institutions and have jurisdiction over some intellectual property cases across regions". It was agreed to establish the Zhengzhou Intellectual Property Court. On March 2, 2018, the Zhengzhou Intellectual Property Court, Henan's first specialized institution for intellectual property adjudication, was formally established. It opened a new chapter for the intellectual property adjudication in Zhengzhou and Henan Province.

On December 14, 2020, the Ninth Plenary Meeting of the Thirteenth Session of the Ningbo Municipal Party Committee was held. The full text of the Proposal was published in the "Ningbo Daily" published on December 21. Among them, the Ningbo Municipal Party Committee Plenary Session stated to “promote the establishment of Ningbo Intellectual Property Court”.

As a strong province of entrepreneurship, innovation and intellectual property rights, Zhejiang has also conducted exploration in the judicial protection of intellectual property rights. Approved by the Supreme People’s Court, Hangzhou and Ningbo Intellectual Property Courts were formally established in Hangzhou Intermediate Court and Ningbo Intermediate Court respectively on September 8, 2017, implemented a cross-administrative jurisdiction model and a trial system integrates "intellectual property rights civil, administrative, and criminal cases".

On June 29, 2020, Zhejiang Province issued the "Decision of the Zhejiang Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China on Building a High-Quality and Powerful Talent Team and Building a High-Level Innovative Province". Article 24 of this paper proposes to strengthen legal protections focusing on intellectual property protection and strive for establishing Hangzhou and Ningbo Intellectual Property Courts to implement the punitive damages system effectively. In addition, Wuhan also proposed the goal of establishing an Intellectual Property Court in the "14th Five-Year Plan" proposal.

On December 18, 2020, the 10th Plenary Meeting of the 13th Wuhan Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China reviewed and approved the "Wuhan Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China on the formulation of the fourteenth five-year plan for the city’s national economic and social development and the 2035 vision Recommendations for goals. The recommendations’ full text was published in the "Changjiang Daily" published on December 30, 2020. The "Proposal" clearly stated to "Strengthen the protection and application of intellectual property rights, and strive to establish a Wuhan Intellectual Property Court."

The Intellectual Property Court is a judicial institution established in the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Several Major Issues of Comprehensively Deepening Reform" to strengthen the use and protection of intellectual property rights and improve the incentive mechanism for technological innovation. On August 31, 2014, the 10th Meeting of the Standing Committee of the Twelfth National People's Congress voted and approved the decision of establishing Intellectual Property Courts in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. On December 31, 2020, the Hainan Free Trade Port Intellectual Property Court was officially started to operate, became the fourth Intellectual Property Court established after Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou.  

Source: chinaipmagazine.com