Author: Zhong Yi, Michael Ni [Shanghai Runhe Law Firm]

1.   Brief Introduction to the First Instance

The plaintiff and the defendant entered into an contract providing that both parties collaboratively develop a set of software whose support of creation and art crafts, and manufacture and sales, etc. is provided by the plaintiff and the defendant shall be responsible for development and script plan of the programme; the copyright of the product belongs to the defendant; the price of the Contract was paid separately by procedure like down payment, test and etc.; after the product is on the market for 30 days and if no quality issues which arouse return of goods, the rest payment will be made by the defendant, or the payment will be offset for the losses of goods; the copyright will be transferred to the plaintiff if the defendant is late for make payment. After the plaintiff delivered the developed software to the defendant, the defendant made it published by publisher for sale in the market under the condition that the software hasn't been accepted in a formal way.  During the procedure of sales, the plaintiff provided supplemental "Q&A of Installation" and "Software Patches" which are sold together with the software by the request of the defendant. After that, the defendant refused to make the rest payment on the grounds that the software has quality issue for which the plaintiff filed the case to the court requesting the defendant to pay the rest payment for developing the software.

Author: Zhong Yi, Liu Jiayin [Shanghai Runhe Law Firm]

In the trial of the case of software copyright infringement, how to determine the amount of damages in the event that the software involved in the case has been taken off the market? Will it affect the determination of the infringement and the amount of compensation if the infringer purchases the upgrade version of the software involved in the case after the litigation procedure begins? The following restatement of the Case will discuss such issues.

From March 24 to 27 in 2010, The 32nd Meeting of Audio Video Coding Standard Workgroup of China ( “AVS Workgroup Meeting”) was held in Guangzhou. Zhong Yi, attorney at law, with his assistant, attended the IPR subgroup meeting discussing the intellectual property policy and the establishment of patent database of the AVS video of second generation. Moreover, we would like to express our heartfelt thanks to Dr. Cliff Reader (the former head of US delegation of MPEG, the chief editor of MPEG-1, the first chairman of MPEG-4 workgroup).

Translated by: G·IPRs (Michael Ni, Katherine, Shanghai Runhe Law Firm, Version: R1.0, January 15, 2010 )

(Judicial Interpretation No. 21 [2009] )

(Adopted at the 1480th Meeting of the Judicial Committee of the Supreme People’s Court on December 21, 2009)

Announcement of the Supreme People’s Court of the People’s Republic of China

On December 10, 2009, Mark R. Shulman led 9 lawyers of the delegation of Association of the Bar of the City of New York, America to visit Shanghai Bar Association. The delegation includes Robert N. Hornick, lawyer and the partner of Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP, Judge John M. Walker of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and Pro. Jerome A. Cohen who in a long term studies Chinese Laws from New York University, School of Law and other famous lawyers, experts, scholars and judges.

The Comparison and Commentaries on Regulations on the Administration of Setting and Revision of the National Standard Involving Patent (Interim) (Exposure Draft) (2009 Nov.) and Regulations on National Standard Involving Patent  (Interim) (Exposure Draft) (2004 Sept.)

Zhong Yi [1]  Ni Jia  Liu Jiayin  [ Shanghai Runhe Law Firm ]

On Nov. 2, 2009, the Standardization Administration of the People’s Republic of China promulgated Regulations on the Administration of Setting and Revision of the National Standard Involving Patent (Interim) (Exposure Draft) (hereinafter "Version 2009") and asks for opinions from specified national organs, public institutions and industrial associations on revisions of which the deadline is Nov. 30, 2009. It is noticed that compared with Version 2009, Regulations on National Standard Involving Patent (Interim) (Exposure Draft) (hereinafter “Version 2004”) promulgated in September of 2004 is adjusted greatly on its contents.