IP scene

Beijing

Special campaign being rolled out

The General Administration of Customs has announced that it will roll out a special campaign to fight infringements upon intellectual property rights this year, with a focus on foreign-funded companies. The move is part of the efforts to improve the country's business environment, customs officials said. Government data showed that Chinese customs nationwide seized 44,500 shipments of counterfeited goods worth 200 million yuan ($29.4 million) involved in foreign trade last year.

Legal Daily

Famed solar terms explained in books

The Palace Museum released a set of two dozen books on Monday aiming to introduce China's ancient and renowned 24 solar terms to the country's younger generation. The solar terms, developed thousands of years ago, are the seasonal division points in the traditional Chinese calendar. In 2016, UNESCO inscribed them on its Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The book set, designed for children aged between 3 and 6, includes 830 hand-painted images of the Palace Museum, 48 traditions, 115 cultural relics, 64 animals and 76 plants, according to the Palace Museum.

Xinhua News Agency

Hubei

New service body founded in Wuhan

An intellectual property service provider association was founded earlier this month in Wuhan, capital of Hubei province in Central China. The new group plans to recommend a group of high-quality IP service institutions to local high-tech businesses and help them deal with IP disputes and improve their innovation capacities, according to the association's officials. The association will also offer training to patent attorneys and improve their professionalism, they added.

China Intellectual Property News

Gansu

Court inaugurated, signals new phase

An intellectual property court, a new division of the Lanzhou Intermediate People's Court, was inaugurated in early January, signaling that Gansu's IP judicial protection has entered a new phase, local officials said. The new establishment in Lanzhou, capital of Gansu province in Northwest China, is a key step toward the province's implementation of the country's strategies of innovation-driven development and IP, they noted. The Lanzhou IP court is the 18th of its kind nationwide.

People's Daily

Ningxia

Trademark festival to be held in July

The 2019 China Trademark Festival is scheduled to be held in Yinchuan, capital of the Ningxia Hui autonomous region, from July 5 to 8. Compared with its previous sessions, this year's event will put more emphasis on trademark protection, frontier issues in the industry, professionals' training and IP development in the west of China, organizers said, adding that the numbers of participants and exhibitors are both expected to reach new highs. Since 2005, the event has been held 10 times.

China Intellectual Property News

(China Daily 01/24/2019 page17)