Legal News

Recently, the antitrust war related to intellectual property is not rare, such as the standards-essential patents dispute between INterDigital Patent Holdings Inc and Huawei, the National Development and Reform Commission launched an investigation on the abuse of market dominance and discriminatory charges alleged with Qualcomm. Article 55 of Anti-Monopoly Law has stated that it shall be applied in dealing with the activities which abusing intellectual property rights to eliminate or restrict competition, however, how to apply it is a question. In view of this, SAIC drafted “Rules” for public comments until 10 July, which will be released soon. “Rules” mainly…

After a lapse of 25 years, “Environmental Protection Law” (Amendment) (“New Law”) was finally enacted, as the basic and comprehensive law on the environmental protection, New Law has made huge changes. Overall changes include applying more requirements on the environment supervisor—-the government; strengthen the requirements and punishment on the environment protectors—-entities and individuals. As for the production-oriented enterprises, the following aspects shall be noted: New environmental economic incentives. Article 21, 22 and 23 of New Law stipulate that the government to take fiscal, taxation, pricing, and other aspects of government procurement policies and measures to encourage enterprises to use environmental…

New Implementation was published by State Council, which includes the following main issues: To refine the formal element for the newly added object. Take the sound mark for example, the applicant shall submit the sample of sound, and the sample shall be stored in light disk in WAV or MP3 mode, and less than 5MB. If the sample is submitted by means of paper, it shall be stored in CD-ROM; the applicant shall describe the sound mark, the description of the sound mark shall include musical notes or numbered musical notation, together with description in text; if the sound cannot…

State Administration for Industry and Commerce announced the Paper on April 14th, 2014, which made adjustments to the original provision in 2003 (“Original Provision”). The main adjustments are as follows: The definition of well-known trademarks. Original Provision defines well-known trademark as ‘a trademark widely recognized by the public and having a high reputation in China’; yet Paper deletes ‘having a high reputation in China’, it also makes it no different to the registered or unregistered trademarks, as well as adjusts the ‘widely recognized by the public’ to ‘known well by the public’. Paper aims at keeping consistent with the revised…

Compared to the rapid development of financial lease business, Rules of the Supreme People’s Court on Issues concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Disputes over the Lease Financing Contracts (No. 19[1996]Fa Fa) is relatively lagged. However, Interpretation has regulated many aspects on those issues related to the lease finance, such as the standard on identifying a lease financing relationship, how to link the lease financing contract with purchase contract, the protection for the leaser’s ownership to the leased item, etc. Hereinafter are 3 important aspects: ‘Sale-leaseback’ shall be deemed as the legal relation of finance lease It’s…

Provisions which has drawn much attention is finally introduced, and will come into force on Mar., 2014. Provisions will bring a huge effect to employers on the following 4 aspects: The auxiliary position shall be defined through democratic discussion and publicity procedure Provisions allows the employer to define the auxiliary position, however, it adds democratic discussion and publicity procedure stipulated in Labor Contract Law. For those employers, they can make good use of this right; but for those dispatched staffs, if there is no representative of them in the labor union, such auxiliary position may not be defined reasonably. The…

Provisions will become effective as of 15 March 2014. Provisions has regulated the guarantee of defective products, claiming for breaching of contract or tort, burden of proof for disputes involving food and drugs. Principle for the guarantee of defective products Where any buyer claims rights against producer and seller, because the buyer purchases food or drug in the condition of having known quality problem in a dispute relating to food or drug, the producer and seller still undertake the liabilities. As we all know that food and drugs are special products which are important to health, so the producer and…

“Notice” has been issued on Dec. 6, 2013, which will come into force on Jan. 1, 2014. The highlights of this “Notice” on Individual Income Tax (“IIT”) on enterprise annuities or occupational annuities are as follows: Deferred IIT treatment. According to the previous regulations, contributions for enterprise annuities shall be combined with the regular salary and calculate the IIT payable accordingly. “Notice” states that Deferred IIT treatment shall be applied according to the following circumstances. For contributions made by companies，no IIT will arise at the time of contribution; For contributions made by employees, the amount no more than 4% of…

With the development of E-commerce, Chinese government encourages and promotes the development of E-commerce, while also strengths the management of the transaction security of E-commerce. In 2013, the State Council and MOFCOM have released relevant new regulations. Meanwhile, MOFCOM and SAIC have published the draft for soliciting opinions on the management of cyber transaction, and the relevant regulations are likely to be released. In Aug. 2013, the State Council issued Opinions on Boosting Information Consumption to Expand Domestic Demand (Guo Fa [2013] No. 32), which proposed to encourage the development of compound business, such as Internet Protocol Television (IPTV), mobile…

The Decision of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress on Amending the Law on the Protection of Consumer Rights and Interests (“Decision”) , which had been adopted by the National People’s Congress on Oct. 25. The Amendment will come into force on Mar. 15, 2014. The Decision includes 31 articles. Hereinafter is the brief introduction of those articles. “Right of Revocation” for consumers without giving reasons. Article 25 of Amendment stipulates that consumers shall be entitled to return commodities ordered online, such as on internet, television, telephone, or by mail, except otherwise required by Amendment, within seven days…