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Chinese companies filed more patent applications in China and overseas last year than ever before, despite a slump in global patenting activity

Until recently, IP owners had to sue trade secret thieves. Now the government can prosecute them. Michael Songer and Traci Rodriguez explain how

Managing IP presents the results of its annual trade mark survey, listing the leading firms in prosecution and contentious work in more than 70 jurisdictions

In China, people call them "unauthorised business enterprise name registrations". In Hong Kong, they are referred to as shadow companies. After concerted efforts by individual trade mark owners as well as trade associations, IP lawyers in both jurisdictions have taken swift and successful action against unscrupulous businesses using the well-known trade marks of others when registering their businesses, often for the purpose of conducting trade in illegitimate goods and services. In February 2010, the Hong Kong Government was set to begin debating a bill to amend the Hong Kong Companies Ordinance in order to empower the Companies Registry to strike off these shadow companies. If passed, this legislation should prove advantageous for legitimate business owners seeking to protect their trade names and trade marks from unscrupulous use.

In 2007 a draft patent law was issued that would bring Syria into line with international standards. The law was signed by the Minister of Economy and Trade and was put before the Cabinet of Ministers for consideration. A copy of the draft (in Arabic) can be obtained from the Syrian Patent Office (www.spo.gov.sy).

When asked about Cardiff, only Russian people who have studied English may recall that it is the name of a city somewhere in the United Kingdom or England (for many Russians England means all of the UK). For still many others Cardiff is vaguely reminiscent of a football or rugby team.

Mexico has been facing a significant problem regarding the sale and distribution of counterfeit products for many years. The Mexican government, with the collaboration of IP rights owners, has taken various enforcement actions against counterfeiters. The most noteworthy of these have been the actions taken at the border to challenge the importation of counterfeits into the Mexican Territory.

The Intelektiv conference on intellectual property in Zagreb, Croatia is the first of its kind organised to promote strategic development of IP assets held by Croatian private businesses.

Because pharmaceutical companies perform time-consuming clinical trials before receiving a marketing authorisation (MA) to put a product on the market, the protection offered by pharmaceutical product patents is often reduced by five to 10 years. This reduces the benefits from an IP monopoly.

Kenji Sugimura of Sugimura International Patent & Trademark Attorneys summarises recent changes in patent practice in Japan