The winner of our 2021 China IP Awards IP Firm of the Year firm comes as no surprise: Beijing-based CCPIT Patent and Trademark Law Office takes the award home for the second consecutive year. The firm is the oldest and one of the largest full-service IP law firms in China, and it continues to provide strong results in both litigation and prosecution work. The firm’s history dates all the way back to January 1957, when a trademark agency was established within the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade, a non-governmental trade promotion organization, to represent foreign companies before Chinese authorities. The agency was the sole trademark agency in China until the mid-1980s. The firm organized a patent agency in the early 1980s, when China began to establish its patent system. The patent agency was authorized as the first Chinese intellectual property law firm to have cross-border representation. In 1993, the two agencies merged to form the CCPIT Patent and Trademark Law Office. The firm is the recipient of many honours and awards, and was a clear winner in this category.

The winner of our 2021 China IP Awards IP Boutique of the Year is Peksung Intellectual Property, which was name winner of the category for the second consecutive year. The firm offers a full spectrum of premium intellectual property services that cover all facets of IP law, including patents, trademarks, designs, copyright, trade secrets, licensing, technology transfer, enforcement, anti-counterfeiting and others for domestic and overseas clients. The firm has a qualified staff of patent and trademark attorneys and highly trained administrative personnel who have many years of extensive practical experience in handling prosecution and litigation. Jiancheng Jiang, one of the founders of Peksung, is a vice president of the All-China Patent Agents Association. Jiang is a well-respected figure in China’s intellectual property circles, and was among the first professionals in the country, when he joined pioneering IP agency China Patent Agent (HK). He founded Peksung in 2003 in response to surging client demands and market dynamics. The firm has been among the country’s top boutiques ever since, boasting clients including Bayer, BASF, Allergan, POSCO and Porsche.

Advance China IP Law Office is regularly one of the top trademark filers in the country, filing more than 22,000 trademark applications in China in 2018. The firm boasts a boutique IP litigation practice of more than 30 litigators, assisted by a group of former Re-Examination Board examiners and technical experts and a strong in-house investigation team. The firm was founded in 1999 by partners who were among the earliest practitioners of IP in China, including founder and managing partner Jie Hu. Hu, who leads the firm from Guangzhou, has more than 20 years of experience working in IP, including many years working as an in-house IP counsel at a leading high-tech company. The firm is active in live-broadcasting, alone or with well-known Chinese IP media, to convey timely IP updates and strategies to a broader audience. “Not just to educate our own clients, but also provide knowledge to a much wider scope of innovators as a public benefit,” the firm said in a statement.

CCPIT Patent and Trademark Law Office is the oldest and one of the largest full-service IP law firms in China, and it continues to provide strong results in litigation and prosecution. The firm has 292 patent and trademark attorneys, with 76 qualified attorneys-at-law. The firm has been on the cutting edge of technology, with its trademark team taking part in the first “cloud-hearing” held remotely over the internet in the Beijing IP Court in February 2020, and then again taking part in the first remote video hearing of a retrial case held by the Supreme People’s Court on April 8. The retrial case is a non-use cancellation dispute, which involves considerable evidence. The Supreme People’s Court applied a remote video hearing system called Zhi Yun for the first time, and conducted activities such as court investigation and court debate according to the country’s laws. The China Trademark Association named the firm an Outstanding Trademark Agency in 2019.

In the past year, GoldenGate Lawyers has opened about 6,000 new files for prosecuting trademarks for both domestic and foreign clients, while continuing to work for prestigious brands including Ritz-Carlton Hotel, Cambridge University, and Columbia Sportswear. The firm says in a statement that it has had new foreign clients’ files transferred to the firm despite Covid-19, such as the French National Museum, Paris Fashion Week, Transferwise, Jagex (a famous UK game developer), and others. It has also taken over the portfolios of new clients, including the global portfolio management for San Yi (三一, sometimes known in English as Sany), which is a top domestic company in heavy industry, and Beijing Urban Construction Group.

Unitalen Attorneys at Law filed 31,734 applications for new trademark registrations in 2020, and handled 23,409 cases for post-registration work. It was recently able to obtain the registration of “China National Convention Center” on behalf of Beijing NorthStar Event Co. The trademark registration was a rare case of success among Beijing municipal state-owned enterprises, as English trademarks for such organizations generally are not permitted to include the words “National” or “China.” At last year’s China International Trademark Brand Festival in Nanchang, the firm won “2020 Extinguished Contribution to Brand and Trademark Construction” and “2020 Outstanding Trademark Agencies” awards, and Unitalen partners and trademark attorneys Hui Huang, Liying Jiang, Jing Yin and Gangqin Zhu were awarded as Trademark Agency Golden Service Individual awards.

Wanhuida Intellectual Property is a leading IP service provider in China with two main legal entities, Wanhuida IP Agency and Wanhuida Law Firm, and offices across the country. The firm is home to some 450 employees, including some 100 IP lawyers specialized in IP litigation and enforcement work and 90 trademark attorneys. The firm is known for many firsts in the Chinese trademark application game, including the first registration of a colour combination mark and the first exhibition priority application with the China Trademark Office.

In the past year, CCPIT Patent and Trademark Law Office handled two cases for ExxonMobil, both of which were appeals of invalidation decisions of the CNIPA against the trademark “霸王1号” in Classes 1 and 7, respectively. In these two appeals, the only cited mark is “黑霸王”, registered and is used on engine oils in Class 4. The firm claimed that the disputed trademark registrations were in violation of Article 30 of the China Trademark Law, as the disputed mark is similar to the cited mark, and the designated goods, though not in the same class, are similar or closely relevant to the goods of the cited mark, and there is the likelihood of confusion. The Beijing IP Court found that the trademarks are similar and determined the goods to be similar ones. “It is important to note that when determining the similarity of goods, one core criterion is to see if the related public are to be easily misled, and the relevance of the goods in terms of their social features as well as their physical characteristics are to be considered,” the firm said in a statement.

Fangda Partners is a full-service law firm with well-recognized expertise in intellectual property. Litigator Gordon Gao is perhaps best-known for his work representing Michael Jordan against Qiaodan Sports in his successful claim to the Chinese character mark 乔丹. In the past year, the firm won a group of 78 Supreme People’s Court cases against Qiaodan Sports). On December 28, 2020, it also won a first instance case before the Shanghai No. 2 Intermediate Court on behalf of Jordan. These cases are the most famous trademark cases in the country; in terms of jurisprudence, they are also among the country’s most important trademark landmarks.

King & Wood Mallesons is a global law firm headquartered in China, making it eligible for domestic China awards. More than a third of its 4,000 lawyers are based in China.The firm has handled notable cases including one relating to the Beijing Olympics, in which it advised the 29th Olympic Games Organizing Committee and Samsung (China) Investment in a dispute over the slogan “One World, One Dream,” obtaining a favourable outcome for its clients. It also advised Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Group (best-known as the manufacturer of Wanglaoji herbal tea) against JDB Group (a Hong Kong-based manufacturer of beverages) in a lawsuit for false advertising, trademark infringement and claim for Rmb10 million in compensation, in which it also obtained a favourable outcome.

Liu, Shen & Associates is led by managing partner Zhanying Jia. One of the founders of the firm, he handles trademark-related administrative and legal proceedings at the firm, as well as registration and opposition work. Jia, who is in charge of the firm’s legal and trademark departments, is a member of the China Lawyers Association, the AIPPI China Group and the LES China Group.

Unitalen Attorneys at Law has a significant practice in all areas of trademarks, including domestic and foreign trademark prosecution, trademark clearance and other counseling issues, licensing and enforcement of trademark, domain name rights, and litigation. The firm says that more than 1,000 clients rely upon it to handle trademark prosecution matters before the Chinese Trademark Office and abroad. The firm assisted Xiaomi in winning an Rmb50 million indemnity in its trademark infringement and unfair competition case; it has represented high-profile clients including Yingli Energy and DJI in trademark matters.

Advance China IP Law Office is a full-service IP firm which is one of the country’s largest such firms, consisting of 900 IP professionals. The firm, which already had offices in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, launched an office in Wuhan in October after the Covid-19 outbreak, seeking opportunities to work with local innovators and to support the local community. As one of the top filers in China, the firm files more than 10,000 patent applications annually.

Liu, Shen & Associates is noted for its work in patent prosecution, and is recommended by clients for smooth interactions in terms of workflow management and expertise. The firm is also a registered law firm, and serves its clients in all phases of intellectual property: acquisition of the rights, transfer and/or licensing of the rights, investment with the rights, enforcement and protection of the rights, and related litigation and administrative proceedings. Most partners have been leading practitioners in the area for more than two decades, and the majority of the professionals have advanced degrees. The firm currently has 41 partners, 180 patent attorneys, 79 attorneys at law (most of whom are also qualified as patent attorneys), and 11 trademark agents.

In 2020, Lung Tin Intellectual Property Agent filed 8,854 new patent applications and 16,546 office action responses before the CNIPA on behalf of its global clients, and worked with foreign associates filing 2,333  new patent applications and 3,235 office action responses in multiple major jurisdictions on behalf of Chinese domestic clients. The firm says that overall grant rate is “excellent” and higher than the average number in the industry. Key clients for patent prosecution include OPPO, Tencent, BOE, Xiaomi, JD.com, Netease, Sinopec, DJI, Delta, TSMC, AUO, LG,  Kyocera, Omron, Sumitomo, Ferrari, Metso, Valmet, Grundfos, KUKA, Sanofi, Lundbeck, nChain, Carlsberg, Evonik, Decathlon, Baxter, Koch, American Express, IFF, Halliburton and Nexteer.

Unitalen Attorneys at Law has a significant practice in all areas of patents, including patent prosecution, counseling, licensing, contracts, technology transfers and portfolio defense with financial transactions. The firm’s patent group has more than 180 attorneys representing both domestic and international preparation and prosecution of patent applications before the Chinese Patent Office and foreign patent offices. Early this year, the firm announced that it had been named “Beijing Excellent Patent Agency (Leading Agency)” by the Beijing Association of Patent Attorneys. At the same time, Chenguang Xue, a partner and patent attorney in the firm’s Beijing office, was named Outstanding Agent of 2019-2020.

AFD China Intellectual Property Law Office is a full-service IP firm which is ranked a top tier firm by the Beijing IP Office, has been a top 10 PCT filer in China since 2009 (and has been top 20 in the world since 2011), and has three times been named a leading agency by the Beijing Patent Attorneys Association with the recognition of providing comprehensive, spot-on and one-stop services. In January 2020, under the joint initiative of Beijing Intellectual Property Protection Association and Beijing Patent Attorneys Association, the Capital Intellectual Property Development Association for the Belt and Road Initiative was launched, with AFD one of the first members of the association. The association will implement the national and capital intellectual property strategy to further enhance the internationalization of intellectual property in Beijing.

IP March recently represented a Chinese company which specializes in eye control interaction technology. Based on the company's ownership of a Chinese invention patent, it filed a patent infringement litigation against a wholly-owned Chinese subsidiary of a foreign company. In return, the subsidiary filed an invalidation request with CNIPA against the invention patent. IP March defended against the invalidation claims, drawing the examiners attention to the differences of the technical solutions between the invention patent and the prior arts cited in the invalidation claim. CNIPA agreed the inventive steps of the invention patent compared to all the prior arts and declared the patent valid. The success of the invalidation provides strong support for infringement lawsuit and subsequent settlement between parties. 

King & Wood Mallesons is a global law firm headquartered in China, making it eligible for domestic China awards. More than a third of its 4,000 lawyers are based in China. The firm is regularly among the top filers of patent applications in China, and has been aggressively increasing its IP litigation team in China and elsewhere. The firm represented Safe-run Machinery (Suzhou) in a patent infringement case important for directing precedent for the requests for declaratory judgment on non-infringement of intellectual property. In July 2019, the Intellectual Property Tribunal of the Supreme People’s Court issued its final ruling on the declaratory judgment of non-infringement regarding a case filed by VMI and Cooper Tyre (Kunshan) against Safe-run. The tribunal ruled that Safe-run did not infringe on the patents of the plaintiffs, dismissed the appeal of the plaintiffs, and upheld the decision of the court of first instance to dismiss the case. This case was the first declaratory judgment on non-infringement heard by the Intellectual Property Tribunal of the Supreme People’s Court since it was established in 2019.

Liu, Shen & Associates is noted for its work in patent prosecution, and is recommended by clients for smooth interactions in terms of workflow management and expertise. The firm is also a registered law firm, and serves its clients in all phases of intellectual property: acquisition of the rights, transfer and/or licensing of the rights, investment with the rights, enforcement and protection of the rights, and related litigation and administrative proceedings. Most partners have been leading practitioners in the area for more than two decades, and the majority of the professionals have advanced degrees. The firm currently has 41 partners, 180 patent attorneys, 79 attorneys at law (most of whom are also qualified as patent attorneys), and 11 trademark agents.

NTD IP Attorneys, established in 1987 under the name NTD Patent and Trademark Agency Limited, was one of the first four Chinese law firms to provide legal services in the area of intellectual property for both international and domestic clients. The firm reported in late 2019 that it had the lowest patent rejection rate among major IP agencies in 2019. The firm also noted that it was listed in the Top 3 Chinese patent agencies representing PCT Applications entering the Chinese National Phase in 2018, with 5,108 PCT patent applications entering the national phase from foreign clients. NTD represented Jiasha Ke Yue Suitcase & Luggage Co. in a patent infringement dispute which was selected as one of the Top 10 IP cases by the Zhejiang courts in 2019. The case mainly relates to a dispute on the interpretation of a term in Claim 1, which can be understood as two different meanings. The appellate court ultimately accepted the firm’s opinion.

East & Concord Partners has a legal team with extensive experience which has successfully rendered legal services to domestic and foreign clients. The firm has aided numerous enterprises in acquiring their copyright, trademarks, logos, and patents for effective protection. The firm advised Shandong Hengzhen Education & Technology Co., in a dispute over whether Yichang Yishi Chengbo Vocational Training School has used textbooks such as Circuit Principles and Circuit System Analysis compiled by Shandong Hengzhen Education & Technology to prepare students for the State Grid Exmination without permission, and hence to determine whether there is infringement of the copyright of the above textbooks. Because of the exam’s wide spread, large number of users and high unit price and large quantity of textbooks and courses, such use would be suspected of serious infringement of the rights of copyright owners. This type of infringement is universal. If not stopped, the firm noted, it will give rise to a chaotic business environment in the vocational training industry, which is not conducive to safeguarding the rights and interests of copyright owners and encouraging the enthusiasm of copyright owners to create new works.

HongFang Law had numerous cases recognized on World IPR Day by entities within China. The Supreme People’s Court selected two cases handled by the firm chosen as part of their Top 50 Cases. The Guangdong High People’s Court picked the firm’s work to seek copyright protection on behalf of Hennessy as one of its Top 10 cases. The firm also advised Yang Gao against multiple companiews in a copyright infringement dispute. Despite all claims dismissed in the first instance, the second instance court reversed the judgment and ordered the defendants to publicly apologize and pay compensation. The final court confirmed that video screenshots can be categorized into photographic work and found automatic photography constituted photographic works for the purposes of copyright law in this case.

JunZeJun Law Offices has nine intellectual property partners. The IP practice comprises a number of specialist practitioners who have both significant government employment experience and significant litigation experience. The firm makes the list partly on the strength of its clientele, which include the Business Software Alliance, Dyson, Adidas and Ferrero. The firm represented Duoyi and Xubo in their Rmb100 million litigation with NetEase involving games copyright infringement and unfair competition. The case involved two top domestic game companies, NetEase and Duoyi. The case includes NetEase’s most well-known game, Fantasy Westward Journey, and Duoyi’s most well-known game, ShenWu. The case is referred as the first case of the gaming industry and has drawn a great deal attention of from the gaming industry. Duoyi lost the first trial, and the court ordered Duoyi to compensate NetEase. After the second trial, the court of second instance finally withdrew the original judgment and sent it back for retrial. After retrial, the court ruled on October 2020, revoking multiple judgments of the original trial and reducing the amount of compensation. Both parties have now appealed to the Supreme People’s Court.

Beijing-based  Tiantai Law Firm is noted for its copyright work, led by Cherry Chunfei Guo. The firm handles work for a veritable Who’s Who of the music and film industry, including Warner Music Publishing, Universal Music Publishing, CCTV Animation Group, Monstercat and the Bejing Federation of Literary and Art Circles. The firm is representing the China Audio-Video Copyright Association (CAVCA) in a suit brought by a karaoke TV operator, which claims that CAVCA constitutes the monopolistic behavior of abusing the dominant market position stipulated in China’s Anti-Monopoly Law, and violates the Regulation of Copyright Collective Management. After nearly two years’ trial, the Beijing Intellectual Property Court rejected the plaintiff’s request. The court held that there is no personal relationship or property dispute between the plaintiff and CAVCA. The plaintiff brought a lawsuit on the ground that the defendant violates the relevant provisions of the Regulation of Copyright Collective Management, which does not belong to the scope of civil litigation accepted by the court. There is no basis for the plaintiff to bring a civil action.

Complementing its TMT practice, TransAsia Lawyers has significantly grown its dispute practice in the past year, especially in respect of commercial dispute resolution. The firm advised PicsArt Inc in drafting, negotiating and revising a series of agreements to acquire copyrights in creative works from various right holders to enrich the content offerings of the PicsArt app, one of the most popular foreign-licensed mobile applications available in the PRC market. It also advised on various deals between the client and various local Chinese distribution platforms to license the rights to the PicsArt applications so they are better integrated into the Chinese market. Due to regulatory constraints and concerns over IP protection, compared with several years ago, there are far fewer US-origin internet content services that remain meaningfully present in the PRC market; PicsArt is one of them and has been one of the hottest mobile applications appealing to Chinese youth.

Shanghai-based Beshining Law Office boasts both corporate and intellectual property practices, as well as having a significant foreign investment practice. The firm’s IP enforcement work runs the gamut, from patents and trademarks to copyright and trade secrets. Founding partner Qi Xue has handled more than 100 IP cases, and has played the role of intellectual property counsel for many enterprises, helping them formulate IP strategies. The firm reports a year-on-year growth of 30 percent, despite challenges from Covid-19; nearly 60 new employees joined the firm last year, and it doubled its office space.

HFG Law & Intellectual Property consists of three entities: HFG Law Firm, HFG Intellectual Property Consulting and HFG Intellectual Property Agency. With the three entities, the firm is well-placed to integrate contentious and non-contentious IP services with corporate law services. The firm conducted raids for Koninklijke Philips, with subsequent criminal litigation in front of the Jiangsu Tanzhou Intermediate Court, which ultimately generated fines of Rmb4.09 million. The firm gathered infringement evidence of a network selling fake Philips products and filed complaints to PSB before cooperating with the PSB to launch the raid action against the warehouses and the factories of eight gangs in two cities in the same day and arrested 15 suspects in total. More than 150,000 pieces of counterfeit products (including products and accessories) and tools of making the counterfeits were seized. Eleven defendants were sentenced to at least three years, and one defendant was sentenced to one year.

Jadong IP Law Firm was founded in 2014 by Yunze Lian, who has nearly four decades of experience in intellectual property law in China. Lian, who also founded the patent and trademark group at Hylands Law Firm and IP investigation company ABIDA, believes that “the best services derive from an intense specialization of services. The more specialized we are, the better services we will provide to our clients. Quality is guaranteed by specialization.” Lian is recognized as an IP expert by the international brand owners he represents, numerous IP publishers and by the IP community in general. Other partners at the firm include Dong Wang, Rebecca Liu, Xiangjing Luo and Lin Jia.

JunZeJun Law Offices has nine intellectual property partners. The IP practice comprises a number of specialist practitioners who have both significant government employment experience and significant litigation experience. The firm acted for a large central enterprise to formulate countermeasures against the malicious infringement of the company's trade secrets by former executives and employees in an action valued at Rmb10 million. The client’s former executives set up new companies with a competitive relationship after leaving their posts, and improperly grabbed its important customers and lured its technical personnel. During the litigation process, the firm’s Danny Ye presented the defendants’ infringement to the court in a complete and clear manner by applying for a lawyer’s investigation order, applying for on-site inspection, and using court trial techniques to make the other party admit their crimes, which plays an important role in the court’s determination of the defendants’ infringement.

Beijing-based Kangxin Partners provides a full-range of intellectual property services. Last year, it helped a client deal with a significant criminal case against infringing factories and their representatives. The firm conducted investigations which resulted in criminal prosecutions against the counterfeiters. It assisted another client through regular monitoring followed by trademark opposition and invalidation actions against the disputed trademark, in which CNIPA only partially supported the manufacturer’s claims. The firm then filed an administrative lawsuit agains the CNIPA decision before the Beijing IP Court. Using relevant judicial precedent, the firm argued that the infringing goods had the same function as the designated goods of the cited trademark, which constituted similar goods. The court supported the firm’s claims and nullified the disputed trademark on the goods; CNIPA will re-issue its decision. 

Tee & Howe Intellectual Property Attorneys, founded in 1995, is a comprehensive IP firm licensed by China Patent Office primarily focusing on foreign IP service. The firm’s practice covers all aspects of intellectual property laws and encompasses all phases of administrative and judicial services such as pursuing and maintaining IP rights and licensing matters. The firm has more than 200 employees, including around 80 patent attorneys and 30 patent engineers, 10 trademark attorneys and five attorneys-at-law. Partner Jie Zhang is director of the trademark and copyright department; he has more than 20 years of experience. Tee & Howe has recently handled trademark licensing instructions from, among others: Beckhoff Automation, Futaba Corporation and Lenovo (Singapore).

Borsam IP is a veteran intellectual property firm based in Shenzhen, with additional offices in Xiamen, Fuzhou and Hong Kong. The firm is particularly noted for its work with rising small and medium enterprises across all of their IP needs. The firm has around 60 staff members, including patent attorneys, trademark attorney and professionals practicing particularly in the biological, electronic, mechanical, chemical, arts and telegraphic communication sectors, and works with both domestic and international clients. TMT work makes up between 30 and 40 percent of the firm’s registration work. The firm’s founding members are litigators Ming Zhang and Zhizheng Lin and trademark expert Dong Lin.

Co-effort Law Firm has provided litigation support to many of the world’s leading companies in the areas of online games, computer software, IT, media and e-commerce. The Shanghai-based firm has one of the top IP practices in that city; led by co-founder Minjian You, more than 60 IP professionals have handled more than 10,000 IP cases, including many “firsts.” Among those firsts was the first online game case in China, a copyright infringement case between Shenzhou Aomei and CGA. Recently, the firm assisted Shengqu Information Technology (Shanghai) Co. in suing the Trademark Office of the CNIPA for refusal of review. Shengqu applied for trademark No. 35558213 Class 35. CNIPA rejected Shengqu’s registration application on the grounds that the disputed trademark applied for by Shengqu was similar to the cited trademark. In the litigation, the firm assisted in the refusal of the retrial case through administrative procedures such as revocation of trademark for continuously non-use for three years, and finally managed to cancel some of the cited trademarks during the second instance.

Globe-Law is noted for its trademark prosecution and litigation work. In the past year, the firm has done significant work for well-known companies including (national media) China Media Group (CCTV), CCTV.com and China IPTV; (internet) Kuaishou, Xiaoduhuyu and iFLYTEK TV; (entertainment companies) Teresa Teng, Chenfan Culture, Fanhuayunsheng Media and Tianhewutong; (movies) OP-Media; (book publishing) Beijing Times Chinese Book Company (Anhui Publishing Group) and Jilin Fine Arts Publishing House. In work for sportswear company Anta, in the second instance hearing on the application for invalidation of a bad faith trademark registration filed in May 2001, the firm successfully rendered the mark to have been invalidated.

An, Tian, Zhang & Partners was founded in 1999 and focuses on intellectual property work, including prosecution and litigation work. It has in recent years done an increasing amount of work for Japanese clients in the pharmaceuticals sector, in part due to its top-notch investigations team, which is noted for its work in patent disputes and trials. The firm notes that it has generally handled around 3,000 patent prosecution annually, including but not limited to design, patent, novelty filings, as well as invalidations of patent rights, etc. In 2020, it advised SDIC in its Series A financing of Xuanzhu Pharma, a Chinese company developing innovative small molecules for oncology. The firm provided IP due diligence services, including patent portfolio analysis, FTO analysis, etc.

Jiaquan IP was founded in 1988 as a government agency with four staff members; in 2001, it was converted into a private law firm and began to grow rapidly. By 2003, it had established its head office in Guangzhou and had grown to 60 staff members. Today, the firm has more than 800 staff members and 10 offices across southeastern China and one in Beijing; it opened a further office in Zhaoqing, Guangdong Province, last summer, cementing its role as the premier IP firm in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area. The firm handles more than 10,000 trademark applications and 30,000 patent applications each year. In 2020, it assisted Jeffree Star, an American Internet celebrity, in successfully cracking down on trademark squatters through invalidation and further litigation.

Beijing-based GEN Law has a standout intellectual property practice noted for its work with complex IP litigation and transactional matters. The firm has litigated over semiconductor, wireless, biopharmaceutical and medical device patents, difficult bad faith trademarks and cross-border trade secret issues, and has won uphill battles in patent invalidation matters and secured victories for ground-breaking technologies. It also advises on major TMT licensing deals, and is very familiar with the increasingly complicated technology import/export control systems. Partner Steve Zhao handles major and complex trademarks, copyrights, unfair competition litigation, commercial litigation and arbitration, compliance, government affairs services, etc., including the recent efforts by the National Basketball Association to combat video sharing in China. The firm devotes significant time and effort to public interest matters, including YesWeDo and TREE charity education programmes; it also advises sustainable development initiatives through the ECO Forum Global Guiyang Forum.