(Source: http://english.court.gov.cn)

The Supreme People's Court (SPC) launched an intellectual property court in Beijing on Jan 1 for better protection of intellectual property in China.

The Intellectual Property Court marks a new step to effectively safeguard IP rights and to advance innovation-driven development and plays an important role in creating a legalized, internationalized and facilitated business climate. The new court will streamline the appeal process by allowing litigants to bypass top provincial courts, said the Supreme People's Court.

Zhou Qiang, chief justice and president of the SPC, said the court will strengthen intellectual property protection and offer judicial assistance and guarantees for building China into a powerful country in this area. He pointed out that the establishment of the court is intended to accept and enforce IP-related cases that involve professional knowledge in China and judicial staff with related professional knowledge will be arranged to handle such cases to improve the quality and efficiency of the trials. He stressed that the court must guarantee the high-quality and high-efficiency of judicial trials and make judgments that can be references for similar cases internationally to improve the credibility of China's courts in intellectual property protection. He also urged deepening of judicial cooperation and exchanges and engagement in the making of intellectual property protection rules to contribute China's experiences in this field.

Besides, the Supreme People's Court (SPC) released a provision on several issues concerning the Intellectual Property Court on Dec 28. The provision will be effective on Jan 1, 2019.

The new provision, intending to offer a detailed explanation of another document about judicial proceedings of intellectual property (IP), was first passed at the 1,756th session of the SPC's judicial committee on Dec 3. The document explains different functions of the intellectual property tribunal of the SPC and the Intellectual Property Court and the court's jurisdiction.

According to the SPC, the intellectual property rights court will mainly accept IP-related cases that involve professional knowledge in China. The court will allow people easier judicial assistance and efficiently resolve IP-related cases. A party must submit materials including retrial application forms to the SPC if they disagree with the judgment or mediation results of the intellectual property rights court.