Court publishes opinion on implementation of National IPR Strategy

By Joseph Simone, Baker & McKenzie.

On March 30 2009, the Supreme People's Court (SPC) issued an Opinion setting out more detailed plans for the implementation of a number of the reforms contained in the State Council's 2008 National IPR Strategy. The Opinion focuses mainly on civil and criminal enforcement of IP rights before the courts. Some highlights are:

• Deterrent penalties: The Opinion proposes that local courts “dramatically” increase the costs to infringers by raising compensation awards, thereby increasing deterrence and lowering the cost of enforcement for IP owners. The SPC particularly encourages courts to award much higher compensation against infringers that are repeat offenders, those violating rights on a “large-scale” and those otherwise acting in bad faith. The SPC has traditionally refrained from encouraging courts to award substantially higher damage awards, but now seems to have opened a door for judges to pro-actively use civil damages to deter more serious infringement.