Challenges of intellectual property protection

Facing the new situation of economic globalization and international intellectual property protection and development, especially after China's accession to the WTO, China's economy will be in line with the world economy, and China's intellectual property work is facing great pressure and challenges. They must earnestly strengthen the protection of intellectual property rights, and through effective protection of intellectual property rights, the country will form a comparative advantage in knowledge resources, thus promoting the economic development and scientific and technological progress of the whole country. First of all, governments at all levels should change their functions in accordance with the principle of governing the country according to law, adapt to the needs of developing the socialist market economy after China's accession to the WTO, create a good policy and legal environment, improve the ways and means of intellectual property protection, increase the intensity of intellectual property protection, improve the national and local intellectual property work system, and promote the rapid development of the national economy, including high-tech industries.

First, the policy is inclined, from the general support for scientific and technological achievements to the key support for patent projects, especially those high-tech patent projects that affect the development level and direction of the industry, and build high-tech national industrial groups with independent intellectual property rights. At the same time, effective measures should be taken to ensure that all awards and remuneration of the patent system are fulfilled, and some major inventions and patented technologies should be rewarded. At the same time, in technological innovation, we should give full play to our own scientific and technological advantages, gain advantages in several technical fields, apply for patent protection, attach importance to the development of patented new products, and occupy and monopolize the market by using the intellectual property system.

The second is to give financial support. Facing the new situation after China's entry into WTO, governments at all levels should establish patent funds with finance and enterprises as the main body, broaden the sources of funds and raise funds through multiple channels and forms. Focus on supporting the implementation of patented technologies with broad market prospects, high technology content and high added value. At the same time, funds for torch plan, spark plan, high-tech industrialization, technological transformation projects, new product development projects and other scientific and technological and economic plans should be tilted towards the implementation of high-tech patent projects, and actively support and develop China's national high-tech industries with independent intellectual property rights.

The third is to guarantee it in mechanism. To strengthen intellectual property work, we must constantly improve China's intellectual property mechanism. Constantly improve the intellectual property legislation and law enforcement system, strengthen the enforcement of intellectual property rights, promote the whole people to pay attention to the legal protection of intellectual property rights through law enforcement, encourage scientific and technological personnel to create more intellectual property achievements, encourage the establishment of independent intellectual property industries, and promote China's economic development. First, we must seize the commanding heights of patent rights in high-tech local fields. China still lags behind the world's industrial powers in the overall and absolute level of high technology, but it also has its own advantages in some local areas, leading the world. Many of its valuable inventions should be highly valued and protected.

Second, we must gain absolute control in the field of ethnic advantageous industries. China has an absolute advantage in some traditional national industries. However, if they stick to tradition and ignore the research and development of traditional industrial technology and the protection of intellectual property rights, their absolute advantages will gradually lose. Outstanding examples are Chinese medicine industry, rare earth industry and gene industry.

Third, strengthen the digestion and absorption of imported technology and patent protection of innovation. Digestion, absorption and innovation after technology introduction are one of the key links of enterprise technology progress, and also the key point of technology introduction success. In the Guide to Technology Import for Developing Countries compiled by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization, digestion, absorption and innovation are even regarded as the basic principles that must be followed when introducing technology. The rise of Japan is not so much the success of technology introduction as the success of digestion, absorption and innovation. After the introduction of Japanese iron and steel technology, major enterprises jointly formed a research team to digest, absorb and synthesize. For every 1 yen spent on technology introduction, 2-3 yen is spent on digestion and absorption research. China is a developing country, and the important way for many enterprises to improve their technological capabilities is technology introduction.

Fourthly, we should adopt the competitive strategy of "making it smaller and bigger". China's entry into WTO will inevitably bring a large number of foreign scientific and technological enterprises, and China enterprises can completely adopt appropriate patent policies to break the exclusive position of others' patents. This is mainly to take advantage of the comparative advantages of late patents and prior patent laws, take the initiative to attack foreign high-tech and the patents applied for after China's entry into WTO, and actively apply for late patents after studying and perfecting the prior patents. An American company applied for a patent in Japan, and the Japanese immediately studied it, changed the color of the patented product and applied for a design patent. As a result, products of this color sell better in the Japanese market than American products, forcing Americans to either "trade large for small" for cross-licensing, or let the market charge licensing fees. Because the Japanese are familiar with the national customs of the country, they take advantage of the Americans with the strategy of "exchanging small for large", but they have only small brains. This case tells a truth. Enterprises in China can also make improvements on the basis of other people's patents, even if it is a small partial improvement. As long as it can produce greater market effect, it can turn passivity into initiative and compete reasonably and legally with patents of foreign enterprises.

Third, the whole society should further raise awareness of intellectual property protection, popularize knowledge of intellectual property protection, and learn to apply for patents for new inventions through legal procedures. At the same time, we should vigorously publicize the role of the patent system in technology. Patent system is not only an incentive mechanism to promote invention and creation, but also a dynamic mechanism to promote the development of science and technology under the condition of market economy.

It is necessary to raise the awareness of intellectual property protection of the whole nation, especially the awareness of leading cadres and business operators at all levels. It is necessary to completely correct the practice of attaching importance only to the appraisal of scientific and technological achievements, publishing papers and applying for awards, while ignoring the application for patents and seeking legal protection, change the ideological concepts of scientific and technological personnel to the track of market economy, act in accordance with the laws of market economy, and reduce the loss of intangible assets. More and more countries have promoted intellectual property protection to a national development strategy.

With the increasingly prominent role of intellectual property rights in the development of world economy and science and technology, more and more countries realize that the key to global competition in the future is economic competition. The essence of economic competition is the competition of science and technology, in the final analysis, the competition of intellectual property rights. Therefore, many countries, especially developed countries, have raised the issue of intellectual property protection to the macro level of national policies and development strategies, and regard strengthening intellectual property protection as an important strategic measure to seize and maintain international competitive advantages in the fields of science, technology and economy. Since 1980s, the United States has taken a series of important measures to strengthen the protection and management of intellectual property rights in order to restore its strong position in the world economy. In the past few decades, Japan has put forward slogans such as "building the country through education" and "building the country through science and technology". In 2002, we further recognized the strategic position of intellectual property rights, formulated the strategic outline of intellectual property rights, and established an intergovernmental conference on intellectual property rights, which positioned "intellectual property rights" at the height of "building a country" and developed into "one of the few intellectual property powers in the world". In addition, Russia, South Korea, India and other countries have incorporated the protection of intellectual property rights in the process of technological innovation into their national strategies while formulating their technological innovation strategies.

(2) The scope of international intellectual property protection is constantly expanding, and the content of rights is constantly deepening.

With the continuous emergence of new technologies and new knowledge, new categories of intellectual property emerge one after another. The protection scope of modern intellectual property rights has expanded from traditional patents, trademarks and copyrights to many objects including computer software, integrated circuits, plant varieties, trade secrets and biotechnology. Developed countries have absolute advantages in high-tech, so the scope of protection is constantly expanding in the fields of electronics, communication, network and biology. For example, the United States, Germany, Britain, Sweden and other countries have started gene patent licensing business. The United States even brought the concept of online marketing model into the scope of patent protection. Internationally, business method patents have long been regarded as "natural products" and cannot be protected by patents. But with the rapid development of world business, this traditional concept is being challenged. Whether business methods have the possibility of patent protection, together with biological gene patents, has become the most concerned topic in the industry at present. More and more developing countries have put forward the idea of protecting genetic resources, traditional knowledge and folk literature and art.

On the other hand, the protection of intellectual property rights strengthens exclusivity. For example, well-known trademarks have been separated from goods or services and included in the protection category as proprietary categories. Gene patents issued by the United States Patent and Trademark Office include not only new genes with complete functional evidence in biochemistry, biology and genetics, but also DNA sequences with unclear functions.

(3) Speeding up the examination and approval time of intellectual property rights, extending the protection period and increasing the punishment for infringement.

In order to encourage innovation and increase intellectual property reserves, many countries improve the efficiency of examination and approval by simplifying the examination and approval procedures and shortening the acceptance time. For example, since the establishment of the United States Patent and Trademark Office 200 years ago, * * * has authorized more than 6 million patents, of which the first 6,543.8+million patents took about 6,543.8+0,000 years, the second 6,543.8+0,000 patents took about 50 years, the third 6,543.8+0,000 patents took about 25 years, and the fourth 654.

Intellectual property is an important civil right, and its existence has a statutory time limit. The protection period of different intellectual property rights formed in the process of technological innovation has different provisions not only in different countries or regions, but also in different periods in the same country or region. According to the provisions of international conventions on intellectual property rights, all countries or regions that participate in international conventions can protect intellectual property rights beyond but not less than the term of international conventions.

With the rise of knowledge economy and the unprecedented promotion of knowledge as a factor of production, all countries in the world have strengthened the punishment for intellectual property infringement. On the one hand, the amount of compensation for intellectual property infringement is gradually increasing. For example, in the United States, the total damages involved in intellectual property litigation from 1990 to 1994 are estimated to reach $92 million, and the infringement compensation is on the high trend. On the other hand, a considerable number of acts of infringing intellectual property rights should bear criminal responsibility. For example, the criminal law of China has a special chapter on the crime of infringing intellectual property rights.