Asia-Pacific

To strengthen copyright protection, and to implement relevant provisions of the Economic and Trade Agreement between the US and China, on August 5 2020, the Supreme People's Court of the People's Republic of China (the SPC) issued a draft Opinions on Strengthening the Protection of Copyright and Copyright related Rights (关于加强著作权和与著作权有关的权利保护的意见) for public consultation.

Back at the end of April, the Committee of the Science and Technology Innovation Board at the Shanghai Stock Exchange announced that the meeting for reviewing the initial public offering (IPO) application of MEMSensing, a Chinese MEMS microphone sensor supplier, was cancelled due to an "emergence of significant matters." The "significant matters" they were referring to were 16 patent disputes brought by Goertek seeking both permanent injunctions and damages totalling over RMB 100 million ($14.5 million). Goertek and MEMSensing are competitors producing MEMS microphones, a key component in the smart speakers of Google, Amazon, Apple, Alibaba, and Xiaomi.

With many employees in Thailand working outside their company's normal IT security fence, their increased use of their own computers and devices instead of those in their offices with standard or enhanced security mechanisms has made it more challenging for employers to control access to key business information. In the rush to set up a fully or partially remote workforce, most companies have had little time to establish work-from-home guidelines on protection of their valuable intangible assets like trade secrets and confidential business information. The need for sufficient internal guidelines on copying files to USB drives, emailing files to personal accounts, and uploading to cloud storage is already widely recognised, but who could have imagined the need for rules precluding sharing proprietary information over Zoom, Skype, Webex, and such programs?

On May 20 2020, the Korean Patent Act (KPA) was amended such that mixed damages of lost profits and a reasonable royalty for patent infringement may be claimed by a patentee and awarded by the court. The amendment will apply to damages filed for on or after December 10 2020.

Are importers and distributors responsible for patent infringement related to the products they import and distribute? This seemingly simple question has still only been partially answered in Vietnam, when the Superior People's Court of Ho Chi Minh City rendered a judgment on July 28 2020 sending a case back to the first-instance court for a retrial.

The Indonesian government has established a compulsory licence framework in anticipation of a COVID-19 vaccine. The framework also applies to national defence and security patents.