EU Seeks Clarification From China on IP Measures in WTO
The European Union posed a series of questions to China at the World Trade Organization in a July 6 request for information, seeking to understand how a series of laws and court decisions in the world's second-largest economy affect the enforcement of intellectual property rights. Recent events have spurred interest from the EU in China's IPR and patent enforcement since there were four Chinese court cases relating to the enforcement of injunctions to standard patents. Some of these decisions relate to court procedures on license and royalty rate questions as well.
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Submitting the questions under the WTO's Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, the TRIPS Agreement, the EU asked about four cases in particular. One of them, Conversant v. Huawei, put in place an "anti-suit injunction" that blocked a European patent holder from enforcing a European Member State court decision relating to the patent. One such question from the EU on the case asks what is the status of adjudication guidelines that the Supreme People's Court IP Tribunal published for deciding on anti-suit injunctions. The EU expects answers to the questions within eight weeks as "this is a case of some urgency."