Indian smartphone patents boom sets alarm bells ringing

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology recently issued a patent pre-warning report for the smartphone industry in the Indian market.

The report said that patents are more frequently being used as a weapon to attack competitors as market competition is intensifying.

Zhou Jie, an intellectual property expert at China Academy of Telecommunication Research under the MIIT, told the Legal Weekly newspaper that Chinese smartphone companies have been sued in Indian courts for IP disputes and their products seized by local customs in recent years.