Annotated Leading Patent Cases In Major Asian Jurisdictions

The first of its kind, this book presents a comprehensive collection of leading patent cases from nine major Asian jurisdictions which are analyzed by eminent scholars and legal practitioners from Asia, Germany, and the United States. It contains thirty case reports covering six topics which best reflect the current trends in Asia in patent law, namely specialized IP court (or division), compulsory licensing, the intersection between patent law and competition law, injunction, damages, and choice of jurisdiction and law in cross-border patent litigation. Each case report explores a landmark case by deconstructing the legal background and the legal reasoning of the decisions, and then discussing the commercial and/or industrial ramifications. The present volume is a useful guide for practitioners, lawyers, and judges alike, a primer for students and businessmen entering the IP world, and a reminder for policymakers, both within Asia and further afield.

In this second volume of the Applied Research Center for Intellectual Assets and the Law in Asia (ARCIALA) series, thirty-seven eminent scholars and practitioners from Asia and the United States have come together to comprehensively assess leading copyright cases from eight major Asian jurisdictions (People’s Republic of China (PRC), India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Taiwan). This book contains thirty-six case reports that focus on six topics that reflect the current trends in Asian copyright law—namely, digital copyright, collective copyright (including the management of copyright and the interface between collecting societies and competition law), criminal copyright (with a discussion of criminal punishment for copyright infringement), limits to copyright (such as fair use and exhaustion), the relationship between copyright laws and other forms of protection, and choice of jurisdiction and applicable law in copyright litigation. Each case report deconstructs the legal background, facts, and rationale of the decision in a particular landmark case, and then discusses the commercial or industrial significance and application. Notably, this includes an analysis of The Hague Convention on Choice of Court Agreements and its adoption in Singapore, which is, to date, the only Asian country to have fully ratified it. Taken together, this volume presents a useful guide for copyright practitioners, professionals, lawyers, and judges alike in addition to acting as a primer for students and businessmen planning to enter Asia’s exciting world of copyright. It also serves as a handbook for policy makers, both within Asia and further afield.

There has been little or no study on trademark laws in Asia on a cross-jurisdictional level. This book aims at filling the existing gap and provides a comprehensive overview of trademark laws of eight major Asian jurisdictions and their most-updated trademark case law. The book analyses six of the principal issues that best reflect Asian features in trademark law and trademark development. The cases in the book are principally the most authoritative decisions, usually the first to deal with certain new emerging issues, or the first to apply particular statutory provisions in the respective jurisdiction. Also included are a small number of direction-changing, outlying or even controversial decisions. Each case report is divided into six sections: summary, legal context, facts, reasoning of the court, legal analysis, and commercial or industrial significance. Readers will find this book useful in both its overview of the legal context and how those cases are to be interpreted legally and commercially.

This book systematically studies the structural characteristics of IP laws and regimes of major Asian economies, including (but not always) China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, and Thailand. It explores and crystallizes some worthy Asian models which could further help the development of international IP laws. This book begins with an overview of Asian modern history and IP laws. It discusses the three basic IP laws in Asia which are patent law, trademark law and copyright law. It looks at the pre-established damages for copyright infringement and trademark counterfeiting. The book also deals with problems with trade secret and its over-protection. It compares IP laws and four industries in India and China, and examines what role have IP laws played in the development in those industries and how India and China can learn from each other. Finally, it examines one medium and one small-sized Asian economy on its respective struggle (Taiwan’s efforts to build a coherent IP exhaustion regime) and a success story (how Singapore has utilized IP to secure its position in global value chains). This book is a useful reference for law students, scholars, practitioners, IP professionals who are interested in knowing Asia, Asian IP laws and industries, their struggles and finding ways to better global IP laws. The case studies could provide helpful lessons for other Asian economies and beyond.

Trademark scholarship has focused largely on the protection of trademark rights against consumer confusion and the dilution of trademarks. Studies of limitations on trademark rights, meanwhile, have remained relatively peripheral, especially in jurisdictions outside of the United States. However, this reality is incongruous with the importance of the limitations, such as descriptive and nominative uses, in promoting freedom of commerce, market competition, free speech, and cultural dynamics. Against this backdrop, Charting Limitations on Trademark Rights is the first comprehensive academic volume detailing limitations in trademark rights from both theoretical and comparative perspectives. The book presents new theoretical perspectives to justify trademark rights limitations, re-examines the nature of these limitations, delineates the scope of the limitations, and offers comparative studies of the limitations. With contributions from leading trademark scholars in the EU, US, and Asia, this is a must read for scholars, students, practitioners, and policymakers with an interest in the theories, policies, and doctrines of trademark law.

This book is a very useful reference guide on how de jure and de facto standards are being developed and how these standards compete against each other. The book also looks at how FRAND commitments are being determined across countries, how these disputes have played out, especially in Asia, and how they can be better dealt with in future globally. The book gives a broad overview of the business model of dominant SEP patentees and analyzes some standards for FRAND licensing of SEPs which are converging in major Asian jurisdictions. It highlights the need for ex ante regulation in the FRAND licensing of SEPs and suggests how we can reconcile conflicts which may arise from different legal standards. This book provides detailed and comprehensive analysis of recent SEP cases with an emphasis on Asia and will interest anyone who wishes to have more insight into the legal, policy, industrial and economic implications of such issues.

In recent years, as companies implement strategies to protect their intellectual property in a competitive environment with rapidly developing technology, trade secret protection law has gained increasing importance. This is especially true in Asia, where the staggering commercial value of trade secrets, fierce cross-border competition, and large-scale labour mobility characterize the region’s economy. This book – the first systematic study of trade secret protection law covering a number of key Asian jurisdictions – provides a detailed analysis of the relevant statutory and case law of Japan, Korea, China, Taiwan, Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, and India. In addition, a chapter on European Union trade secret protection law is included for further purposes of comparison. Thirty-one local experts provide a clear overview of national laws and practices by examining the following aspects of their respective national regimes: requirements of trade secrets; validity and scope of confidentiality and/or non-competition clauses; burden of proof and its shifting or reversal; order for protecting the secrecy of a trade secret during prosecution and trial; civil remedies (injunctive relief and damages); and criminal punishment for trade secret infringement. With its authoritative insights and comprehensive coverage of the dynamic and multifaceted development of trade secret protection law in Asia, the book will be a primer for practitioners, corporate counsels, judges, and scholars concerned with cross-border protection of intellectual assets.