Recent Developments in China’s Antimonopoly Regulations on Abuse of Intellectual Property Rights

• Author: Wang Xianlin
• Published date: 01 December 2017
• Date: 01 December 2017
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/0003603X17735197

Article

Recent Developments in

China’s Antimonopoly

Regulations on Abuse of

Intellectual Property Rights

Wang Xianlin*

Abstract

Over the past decade, while strengthening intellectual property rights (IPR) protection, China has also

explored means to regulate the abuse of IPRs. IPR protection in China is mainly based on the Anti-

Monopoly Law (AML), in particular Article 55. Recent years have seen more and more judicial and

administrative enforcement practices related to China’s antimonopoly regulation on the abuse of IPRs.

Provisions on the Prohibition of the Abuse of Intellectual Property Rights to Eliminate or Restrict Competition

was released on April 7, 2015, and the draft of Antimonopoly Guidelines in Relation to the Abuse of

Intellectual Property Rights was released for public comment in early 2017. It can be expected that

China’s antimonopoly guidelines on the regulation of abuses of IPRs will come out in the near future.

Keywords

antimonopoly, intellectual property rights, abuse, China

I. Background and Legal Basis of China’s Antimonopoly Regulation

on the Abuse of Intellectual Property Rights

The improvement of the Chinese legal system for intellectual property rights (IPRs) has led to a

strengthening of the protection of IPRs. As abuses of IPRs have occurred from time to time, so have

restrictions of competition through the abuse of IPRs. In A Report of the Study on the Abuses of

Intellectual Property Rights by Transnational Corporations in China and Corresponding Counter-

measures

1

published in 2005, a key commissioned research report under the National Soft Science

*Law School, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China

Corresponding Author:

Wang Xianlin, Law School, Shanghai Jiao Tong Univesity, 1954 Huashan Road, Xuhui District, Shanghai, 200030, China.

Email: wangxianlin@sjtu.edu.cn

1. A National Soft Science Research Project (No. 2005DGS2D053) conducted by the joint research team of Anhui University

Law School and Shanghai Jiao Tong University Law School, led by Wang Xianlin in 2005. The main contents of the report

were published as an article titled Abuses of Intellectual Property Rights by Transnational Corporations in China,21B

US.

WATCH MAG. (2005).

The Antitrust Bulletin

2017, Vol. 62(4) 806-814

ªThe Author(s) 2017

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DOI: 10.1177/0003603X17735197

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