The EU-China Business Association, the Flanders-China Chamber of Commerce and the China IPR SME Helpdesk organized a webinar focused on “IP Protection at Online Trade Fairs” on 29 July 2020. IP Business Advisor Matias Zubimendi gave a presentation on a successful IP strategy when attending online trade fairs. The webinar ended with a Q&A session where attendees raised their questions and interacted with the speakers.

Moderator Ms Helika Jurgenson, Project Manager, China IPR SME Helpdesk, welcomed the participants and introduced the webinar. Ms Jennifer Cao, Project Officer at the China IPR SME Helpdesk, gave a brief introduction of the Helpdesk. Next, Ms Gwenn Sonck, Executive Director of the Flanders-China Chamber of Commerce and the EU-China Business Association introduced both organizations.

According to a short survey, 14% of the participants to the webinar had participated in online trade fairs, while 45% hadn’t. Another 36% said they hadn’t participated in any online trade fairs, but planned to and 5% of the participants responded they wouldn’t participate because it was too complicated. Ms Jurgenson said it was really good that 14% had already participated in online trade fairs since those fairs had only been held in the past three months.

Mr Matias Zubimendi, IP Business Advisor at the Helpdesk, explained how to safely attend online trade fairs. There are five main intellectual property rights: innovation patents & utility models; design patents; trademarks; copyrights and trade secrets. The main principles are registration and territoriality. In China, IPRs that are not registered have almost no protection at all. The company or person that made the first registration has priority over all future registrations. The IPR is limited to the country were the registration was done. For example, a trademark registered in Europe will not have any effect in China, unless it is also registered in China. When participating in a trade fair we should know in which country this is happening. We have to plan in advance to have protection in this country. In the case of an online trade fair, this becomes a little more complex because we have to discuss where online trade fairs take place.

What is the difference between regular and online trade fairs? I personally attended already four online trade fairs. You have a list of exhibitors and you can also look for specific products. You will see information of the company and be able to make a purchase, to ask further information about the product, or request a meeting. During online trade fairs there are also regular events, such as a welcoming ceremony, promotions of the place and of the companies, webinars, videos, and finally a goodbye ceremony. Online trade fairs allow exhibitors to give their own presentations. Just like regular trade fairs, online ones are match-making events, it is possible to make some contacts, but the format is not yet well developed. You can usually purchase a sample at online trade fairs and this is an opportunity to check the quality of the products as you will not see them like at a regular trade fair. A limitation is that there is no real contact with the company. Participation in an online trade fair is cheaper and in case of IPR infringement it will be easier to obtain evidence.

Where do online trade fairs take place? There is a debate about the jurisdiction of websites. Which law is going to be applicable and will my trademark registered in the EU be enforceable in the online trade fair? During the duration of the trade fair you will not be able to discuss complex topics. We can say that the online trade fair will be happening in China and Chinese law will be applicable. But you also have to take into consideration that both regular and online trade fairs have their own rules and procedures for complaints of IPR infringement.

In which country should I protect my IP? If the trade fair is happening online you have to protect your IP in the country of the organizers, in our case China, so it is best to register your IP in that country. What are the main risks of participating in a trade fair? What are the potential dangers to my IPRs? In the case of patents, the main danger is to lose the requirement of novelty. Novelty has to be global and is going to be checked during the registration process. Any disclosure may invalidate future protection. Your company will have to pay special attention when participating in a trade fair and deciding what kind of products or designs will be exposed, because they should already be registered before disclosure. In the case of China there is an exception in the case of patents. If the online trade fair is an international exhibition sponsored or recognized by the Chinese government, there is a grace period of six months for making the registration. By disclosure we mean that the product or design should not be made available to the public, so if you upload a picture to the online trade fair and everybody can have access to it, there is disclosure and loss of novelty. If your specific technology is located inside the product, there won’t be any problem, because nobody will be able to know anything about this new technology just by looking at the picture. If I am an exhibitor and somebody asks for a private meeting because he is interested in buying my product, can I show more to that person? I would say no, but if it is an important client, you could disclose a little bit more of information by covering yourself with a non-disclosure agreement. In this case you are treating the patent as a trade secret because it has not been registered yet. However you should not give non-disclosure agreements to everybody approaching you at the trade fair.

In the case of copyrights the main risk is to be copied. In an online trade fair this is less likely to happen. In the case of trademarks, the risk is also to be copied and somebody could register it to sell it to you later. Taking down a registration is not easy in China. You will have to go to court and the process will take more than a year. If you have a translation made of your trademark, check the characters to see if they communicate good values. If you launch a promotion in China with your Chinese name, your products may be known under that name in China and not under your original name. Therefore, register both trademarks. Your Chinese name will be more important than your original name. Finally, trade secrets get lost once they become public. The general rule is do not take any sensitive information to a trade fair and in the case of an online trade fair, do not upload any sensitive information. When deciding which information to upload, double-check to make sure that no trade secret is to be lost. Your negotiator at the trade fair should also be aware of this. Trade fairs are very important events in China, so it is advisable to include China in the countries where your patent is protected.

What to do before the trade fair? Register your IPR as soon as possible, no registration means no protection. Prepare your team; decide who will participate and assign them roles; who is going to be the negotiator or seller; teach them how to use NDA; assign some people to control other exhibitors and events; teach them how to collect evidence and how to enforce your IPRs by contacting the complaints center.

How to proceed if I detect an IP infringement? First collects all the evidence. The most efficient way is through a notary. Blockchain is another method, you can protect your information with blockchain and it will not be modified at all. Another method is obtaining samples online with the assistance of the notary. You can get company information through the National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System. It is also advisable to contact your local Chinese attorney. During the trade fair you can go to the complaints centers. Compared to the local courts, they are faster and more effective, and they will immediately remove any infringing offer. But the disadvantage is that you will not get compensation and the seller will continue operating and at the end of the day you will not be solving the real problem. You can first go to the complaints center to remove the infringing products from the trade fair and then go to the local courts. In the case of online copyright infringement, you can go to the internet courts of China. They are really fast and the hearings all take place online. The hearings on average take 28 minutes and the whole procedure 25 days. This only works for copyright infringement, not for trademarks. In China, many bad faith sellers are registering trademarks as copyright. So you can make a copyright of your trademark and go to the internet courts.

What to do after the trade fair if you encounter an infringement? Register your IP rights with the Customs office, avoiding that they export the products abroad. Continue to research the infringing participant and e-commerce sites to check if they continue to sell online. Finally, you can use cease and desist letters and go to the courts.

Take-away messages: register your IP in advance; do not disclose your trade secrets; get familiar with the IP complaint rules and procedure; have your legal team ready to act; collect evidence before starting any action; collect as much evidence as possible; and keep an eye on the infringers. You can contact the China IPR SME Helpdesk at question@china-iprhelpdesk.eu.

Q&A session: How long does it take on average to deposit a trademark and how much does it cost? The average time is eight months to a year if there is no opposition. The fee is CNY300 or about €37. Do the internet courts conduct a substantial examination? There is a comprehensive analysis, the fact that everything happens online does not mean that the procedure is less strict. You should be able to explain everything. What risks could be associated by uploading your product information to a virtual exhibition? If you only provide simple information about your products, there won’t be any risks. The most important part to take into consideration is that you don’t disclose any characteristics of your technology that can be part of a future patent.

Barricade at the entrance to a residential compound in Dalian in February

The last couple of days, China daily reported less than 50 confirmed cases and less than 25 asymptomatic cases. However, before dropping again, the number of daily infections discovered had risen to the highest in three months, propelling fears of a new wave of the pandemic.

New clusters have now been detected in several cities. A cluster in Dalian in Liaoning province spread infections to eight other cities within five days, and the city government decided to test the whole population within four days. The comprehensive testing prioritized residential communities that are densely populated, with all costs covered by the government, the Dalian Health Commission said. The Commission assigned more than 3,300 medical employees to assist in administering nucleic acid tests. Like in Wuhan and Beijing, Dalian also adopted the sample pooling test method, mixing five samples together as a group. If found positive, each sample will be tested separately to determine which one is infected.

As the number of cases in Hong Kong continue to increase, the SAR government first banned in-house dining in the evening, then expanded it to include breakfast and lunch, to retract the expansion after only 48 hours because many employees had no other option but eating in the street even in high temperatures and heavy rain. A truck driver traveling between Hong Kong and the Chinese mainland was confirmed with a Covid-19 infection, prompting Shenzhen to test thousands of residents and step up measures to prevent the port from becoming a loophole in the mainland’s epidemic control work. Given frequent interaction between Hong Kong and Shenzhen, and the worsening infection situation in Hong Kong, analysts said Shenzhen ports as well as nearby cities should raise entry requirements and conduct more tests to identify silent carriers and reduce transmission risks. Wang Peiyu, Deputy Dean of Peking University’s School of Public Health, said it is unrealistic to completely shut down the border ports between Hong Kong and Shenzhen given the frequent interactions. A more realistic method to prevent the virus from spreading is that the Shenzhen side should manage to identify silent virus carriers and give repeated tests if necessary to reduce the risks of allowing people with false-negative nucleic acid tests in, Wang told the Global Times. Medical personnel from mainland China is going to Hong Kong to help conduct mass Covid-19 testing, after the city confirmed another 121 coronavirus cases, the tenth straight day of triple-digit increases in infections. Mainland staff will also help with the construction of community isolation and treatment centers. Hong Kong has reported 3,396 Covid-19 cases since the beginning of the epidemic and 33 related deaths.

Northwest China’s Xinjiang Region is also still fighting against Covid-19 clusters. Experts said after gene sequencing the virus in Xinjiang that it is similar to the viral strain of Beijing’s recent outbreak, and that with support from across China, the region is expected to bring the situation under control within one to two weeks. There is a large number of asymptomatic cases. Many patients were tested before they showed symptoms, which is a good sign for epidemic control, Zhang Yuexin, Director of the Infectious Disease Department of the First Affiliated Hospital of Xinjiang Medical University, told the Global Times. Yang Zhanqiu, Deputy Director of the Pathogen Biology Department at Wuhan University, told the Global Times that the summer season and high temperatures might weaken the effect of the virus on individuals so they display fewer symptoms.

The China Daily reported that Sansure Biotech, a company based in Changsha, Hunan province, has independently developed a fast Covid-19 nucleic acid testing system, which shortens detection time to within one hour. The system doesn’t require a professional laboratory and gives a test result within 15 to 45 minutes. The system obtained the National Medical Products Administration approval and the European Union’s CE mark in April.

Chinese President Xi Jinping attended a ceremony in Beijing to mark the launch of full global services of the Beidou-3 Navigation Satellite System, indicating that China’s domestically-developed and independently-operated global satellite navigation system has been fully completed. The Beidou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) is China’s largest space-based system and one of four global navigation networks, alongside the U.S.’ GPS, Russia’s GLONASS and the European Union’s Galileo. It provides global users with basic navigation, global short message communication, and international search and rescue services. At present, the system’s services cover more than 200 countries and regions, with more than 100 million users and 200 million daily services. “Beidou is not only China’s Beidou, but also the world’s Beidou. It not only serves China, but also serves the world,” Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin said.

The BDS system has been completed in 26 years since it was first started in 1994. More than 400 entities and over 300,000 scientists worked on the project since its inception. On June 23, the Long March-3B launch vehicle, carrying the last satellite of the BDS, blasted off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in Xichang, Sichuan province. The satellite was the 55th in the Beidou system, and has begun providing navigation, positioning and timing services. From November 2017 to June 2020, in 31 months, China successfully launched 30 Beidou-3 network satellites and two BeiDou-2 backup satellites, at a success rate of 100%, creating a new record for the world’s satellite navigation system network launch, with the speed of deployment exceeding an average of one satellite every month. The system is completely free from imports of core components as they are 100% home-made. “Key technologies that cannot be brought or obtained from other countries, especially during this pandemic period, sometimes decide the level of a country’s development. The only way for a country to achieve long-term stability and prosperity is to make utmost efforts to ensure their independent development of high technology,” Gao Lingyun, an expert at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), told the Global Times.

The successful launch of BDS ensures the satellite navigation industry enters “a new golden age” in terms of comprehensive applications, insiders said. China’s domestic satellite navigation and location service sector has grown to around 14,000 companies with over 500,000 workers in five main industry clusters across the country. China’s BDS played an important role in providing mapping services that supported the rapid construction of the Huoshenshan and Leishenshan temporary hospitals in Wuhan at the beginning of the year, when the city was struck by the outbreak of Covid-19. BDS terminals were also carried to the top of Mount Qomolangma for the first time in late May to help a Chinese surveying team measure the height of the world’s tallest mountain. By the end of 2019 on the Chinese mainland, more than 6.5 million road vehicles, 40,000 postal and express delivery vehicles, 80,000 buses in 36 major cities, 3,200 inland navigation facilities, and 2,900 marine navigation facilities were using services from BDS, forming the world’s largest dynamic monitoring system for road vehicles. In the first quarter of 2020, more than 70% of smartphones in China used Beidou services. A report by the GNSS and LBS Association of China showed that the industry’s market scale is expected to exceed CNY400 billion by the end of 2020, up from CNY340 billion in 2019.

China has also achieved other successes in space. In January 2019, China’s Chang’e-4 probe touched down on the far side of the moon, becoming the first spacecraft to make a soft-landing on the moon’s uncharted side that is never visible from earth. In July, China successfully launched its first Mars probe, Tianwen-1, on a Long March-5 Y4 carrier rocket from Wenchang Space Launch Center in Hainan province. The move heralded a new era for China’s deep-space exploration that has steadily progressed beyond moon probes to interplanetary missions, the Global Times reports.

Chinese Vice Premier Liu He and Valdis Dombrovskis, Executive Vice President of the European Commission, jointly presided over the eighth China-EU High-Level Trade and Economic Dialogue (HED) via video link. Commissioner for Trade Phil Hogan also attended. The two sides have reached fruitful results and consensus in terms of cooperation in a range of areas, including the joint fight against Covid-19, global economic governance, industrial chain safety, a bilateral investment treaty (BIT), WTO reform, expanding market opening-up, digital economy, finance and taxes, the Global Times reports. The coronavirus is a common challenge for humanity. China and the EU as two major economies are pushing a global unified approach in the fight against Covid-19 and for an economic rebound, and are jointly safeguarding multilateralism and free trade, Vice Premier Liu said, according to Xinhua. The EU and China are important partners, and advancing bilateral relations serves the common interest of both sides, Dombrovskis stated.

Cui Hongjian, Director of the Department of European Studies at the China Institute of International Studies, said: “There are three high-level dialogues being held between the two sides every year concerning diplomatic, economic and cultural communication. We have so far seen the resumption of two dialogues.” In June, China and EU held the 10th round of their high-level strategic dialogue via video link, with both sides vowing to develop closer ties. Cui added that both sides have displayed calmness, with the EU side in particular not bowing to pressure from Washington and maintaining an independent economic development path from the U.S. China may open up more fast-track channels for the entry of personnel of foreign companies based on the principle of reciprocal treatment. Also, more positive signals on the progress on the BIT may be released after the meeting concludes, according to Cui.

China is on course to become the only major economy to post positive growth this year, according to the IMF’s latest global economic outlook projections. The Washington-based fund put China’s growth at 1% for 2020 and forecast it to rise to 8.2% in 2021. The economy of the euro area is estimated to contract 10.2% this year before rebounding to a negative 6% the next year. Bloomberg expects China’s economy to grow 2.5% this year. Oxford Economics also upgraded its full-year GDP forecast to 2.5% from 2% on a strong rebound in the second quarter.

According to a EU press release, Executive Vice President Dombrovskis said: “The current crisis gives us no other option but to work hand in hand with our global partners, including China. By pulling together we can recover more quickly economically, and make progress on areas of mutual interest such as trade and investment relations. However, we also need to address sticking points such as reciprocity in the way our companies are treated. We will need to make further progress on these and other issues ahead of the next leaders’ summit in the autumn.” Commissioner Hogan said: “EU-China bilateral and trade relations must be based on the key principles of reciprocity and a level-playing field based on clear and predictable rules. Today I have called upon China to engage in serious reform of the multilateral system and its rulebook and to remove the existing barriers impeding access to the Chinese market of EU exporters of goods and services as well as of European investors. Such an approach by China would show a level of responsibility which reflects its economic and trade importance.”

On market access, the EU reiterated its request for improvements of China’s offer in the telecommunication and computer sectors, health, biotechnology and new energy vehicles (NEVs). On sustainable development, the EU insisted upon the political importance of meaningful commitments in this area and the need for China to increase its ambition and engagement.

With regards to market access, the EU recalled its request to China to authorize member states’ exports of agricultural products currently awaiting export authorization, as is the case in the beef and poultry sector. The EU also outlined its concerns about new restrictions on food exports, on the ground of controlling the coronavirus pandemic, leading to an increased number of unjustified inspections, controls and requests for certificates on EU exports of agricultural products. Both sides also discussed market access in the financial services sector, with the EU side encouraging China to continue opening China’s financial services market to foreign investment, according to the EU press release.

The EU Council also expressed “grave concerns” over Hong Kong’s national security law and approved restrictions on exports of equipment for end use in Hong Kong, eliciting a stern response from the Chinese Mission to the EU. “China is firmly against the EU’s wrong moves and has made serious representations with the EU side,” a spokesperson for the mission said.

Chinese electric car start-ups delivered 44,000 units in the first half, up 44.46% year-on-year and bucking the declining trend for new energy vehicles (NEVs), according to the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission (CBIRC). Startups sold 11,461 vehicles in June, an increase of 18.19% year-on-year. But total new energy vehicle sales fell 37.4% to 393,000 units in the first half, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM). With the improving pandemic situation and government policies to promote auto sales, the fall in new energy vehicle sales in the second quarter was lower than in the first three months. Some companies are raising funds and going public as they try to grab market share and develop models. The country’s auto startups are mostly targeting drivers in their 30s who are willing to pay for the latest technology offered by NEVs. Due to the launch of new models and increasing demand for replacement vehicles in the first half, sales of these companies are better than the overall market. In the first half, NIO remained the market leader, delivering 14,048 vehicles. Li Auto ranked second with 9,667 units and WM Motor ranked third with 5,772 cars delivered. They were followed by Xpeng Motors, which delivered 5,663 units from January to June.

Li Auto raised USD1.1 billion in a U.S. initial public offering (IPO). Guangzhou-based Xpeng Motors has filed confidentially to list in the U.S. But it has not yet chosen between the Nasdaq or the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). China’s auto sales are set for a third straight year of decline, analysts say. The boost from pent-up demand and government incentives will likely fall in the second half, the Shanghai Daily reports.