Industry coalition calls for more information for overseas investors

SHANGHAI - An industry-based coalition said it warmly welcomed China's six-month nationwide intellectual property (IP) enforcement operation between October 2010 and March 2011.

It suggested that the government should communicate more about the issue, and allow foreign investors wider access to information related to intellectual property rights (IPR) issues.

The State Council held a special conference on IPR protection on Nov 5, and Premier Wen Jiabao said that strengthening supervision and the related law implementation would improve China's investment environment.

Jack Chang, General Electric's senior IP counsel and chairman of the Quality Brands Protection Committee (QBPC) said the gesture was encouraging.

"I think this six-month IP enforcement operation is a very important move to strengthen foreign investors' confidence in China's efforts to improve the so-called soft investment environment," said Chang.

"Based on a decade of experience of working on the front line with the Chinese government and various stakeholders, I am confident that the domestic IP environment will continue to improve through the government's efforts, and those of the QBPC and other stakeholders through constructive dialogue and cooperation," said Chang. He added there has been significant progress in the IP environment compared with that of 10 to 15 years ago.

The IP Tribunal of the Supreme People's Court has also taken significant steps in terms of improving the capacity of IP judges and transparency of the country's civil IP case trial.

However, at a time when increasing numbers of foreign investors are paying more attention than ever to China, the IP infringements are still serious, as the pattern of IP infringement keeps evolving.

Meanwhile, the national innovation policy has also attracted the attention of many QBPC members.

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China is such a big country that any issue will be a big one, according to Chang. "I think China really needs to communicate more, and really needs to allow foreign investors wider access to information including the innovation policy, administrative IP protection, and the civil as well as criminal IP court case trial."

"When I was trying to convince my members that China's IP protection actually is not discriminating against foreign IP owners, only a few court sites had data showing litigation involving foreign parties," he added.

Chang said that China had been called the center of counterfeiting export for many years by some foreign public and private sectors.

That situation did not change until the QBPC provided a case study, which showed that many foreign buyers were coming to China with samples of genuine products, which they intended to use as templates for the manufacture of counterfeit goods for export. It was then that people began to realize that IPR theft is an international problem.

And it's a problem that requires collaboration between the production, destination and transition countries so that they can jointly tackle it, rather than simply viewing it as a wholly Chinese problem.

Currently, one of the key issues is that of innovation policy, which has attracted a lot of attention. Many overseas investors think the policy discriminates against foreign players.

"We are very happy to learn that a number of leaders, including Premier Wen Jiabao, have stated that China will provide equal treatment to both domestic and international companies. This is a very important message, and one that needs to be handed down to the local level," said Chang.

He believes that the QBPC must continue to provide constructive opinions and support the government in improving the business environment to allow fair competition.

It must also help domestic players to connect with the international business community, as innovation capacity and entrepreneurship can only be fostered through competition, and not by government planning.

"The challenge for the QBPC now is how we work with Chinese companies, and help strengthen their internal capacities, so they can learn how to compete independently in the international market rather than simply depending on government support," said Chang.