Tag Archives: inventor

Shanghai Court Promulgated New Rules on Service Invention Remuneration and Reward

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(By Albert Chen)  Recently, the Shanghai Higher People’s Court (the “Higher Court”) issued the Guidelines on the Trial of Employment Remuneration and Reward for the Inventor and Designer (the “Guidelines”), which has further provided the issues involving the standard of the remuneration and reward as well as their payment. In today’s post, the author would like to interpret the new regulations in the Guidelines.

I. The standard of the service invention remuneration

According to the Guidelines, the remuneration for the service invention shall not be less than RMB 3,000 and not less than RMB 1,000 for  design patent and utility model.

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Who Has the Burden of Proving “Profit After Tax” When Calculating Remuneration for a Patented Invention?

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(By Albert Chen) In the previous post, the author introduced how to determine the unit granted the patent right by looking at a case decided by a Shanghai court. Today, the author will use a case from a Guangdong court to introduce how the court there held on who must prove “the profit after tax” when a dispute breaks out on invention remuneration payable by the unit granted the patent right.

Summary of the case:

The employee inventor, Mr. Zhu, worked for Dongguan Wei Ba Cleaning Equipment Co., Ltd (the “Wei Ba Company”) from 1998 to 2006. During his employment, Mr. Zhu participated in the development of sixteen patents and was also registered as a joint inventor in the company’s patent applications. Afterwards, the Wei Ba Company exercised some of the patents but did not pay Mr. Zhu any remuneration. For this reason, Mr. Zhu filed a lawsuit against the Wei Ba Company, claiming that remuneration payable for his invention should be calculated based on the 2004 Annual Joint Inspection Report that the Wei Ba Company submitted to the Ministry of Commerce, which indicated the company’s total profit after tax. Moreover, Mr. Zhu claimed that the remuneration shall be calculated for the past two years.

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Shall Parent Company Make the Payment for Subsidiary Employees’ Invention for Hire?

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(By Albert Chen) In past essays, the author has introduced the legal issues related to the establishment of remuneration for inventions developed under work for hire schemes, and payment of said remuneration. Through a study of two recent cases, the author has found that the comments made by the judge in them is of reference value when deciding the “unit granted the patent right” and the “one liable to prove after tax profits”. In the meantime, the author would like to share his interpretation and analysis in these two posts.

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New Rules on the Protection on the Patent Made for Hire in China

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(By Albert Chen) In previous posts, we introduced our readers to ways to pay remuneration for the invention made for hire, and the standard adopted by Chinese courts in related disputes. On 26th November 2012, the State Intellectual Property Office (the “SIPO”), accompanied by 12 other authorities, jointly released the “Several Opinions on Further Strengthening the Protection of Service Inventor’s Legal Interests and Promoting IPR Implementation (the “Opinions”), which demand a strengthened protection on the rights of service inventors in several aspects. In today’s post, you will be able to become more familiar with the main points contained within the Opinions.

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How Chinese Courts Determine Remuneration for Employee Inventions?

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(By Albert Chen) Yesterday’s post introduced regulations concerning calculation and payment of remuneration for the invention made for hire. The post also pointed out problems in the existing law, both at the by the central government and local level, namely that they lack binding authority, have low enforcement, or provide inadequate regulation on the liability of the unit.

The author has conducted research on these points in the established cases in China and found a case decided last year by the Guangdong High People’s Court (“Guangdong Court”), which is of referential value to settling the above problems.

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How Should Chinese Businesses Pay Remuneration for Inventions Created by Their Employees?

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(By Albert Chen) Statistics have shown that since 2007, the invention made for hire have comprised over half of China’s patent applications, and the number is still increasing. According to Article 16 of the Patent Law: “The unit that is granted the patent right shall reward the inventor or designer of an employee invention. After such patent is utilized, the inventor or designer shall be given a reasonable amount of remuneration according to the scope of application and the economic results.”

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