Intellectual Property Law Developments in Asia

431 days ago - Featured, The Fashion Lawyer : 2 Comments

ASEAN

The Patent Prosecution Highway system should speed up the examination process, by allowing patent examiners in one country to rely on the examination conducted in another Patent Office. Only two South East Asian countries have signed up to this system.

1. Singapore signed up with the US and Japan. Therefore it will be quicker for Singaporeans to register patents in the US and vice versa for American.

2. The Philippines recently signed up with Japan.

Australia

1. The Intellectual Property Laws Amendment (Raising the Bar) Bill 2011 passed through both Houses of Parliament and is expected to receive Royal Assent within the next couple of weeks. After that it will become law in Australia, but the substantive portions will only become effective within 12 months. This will allow for a smooth transition. I wrote about this Bill and you can read about it here.

2. The Attorney General announced that she will ask the Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC) to review the operation of copyright in the digital environment. The ALRC will report on whether the exceptions in the Copyright Act are adequate and appropriate in the digital environment.

Brunei Darussalam

The Inventions Act, Chp 72 has been repealed by the Patents Order, 2011. The Patents Order is now effective and the only subject matter excluded is invention pertaining to method of treatment of the human or animal body by surgery or therapy or of diagnosis practised on the human or animal body, as it is not capable of industrial application. Therefore, everything else is patentable.

Prior to the Patents Order, Brunei did not have a patent system. Protection was obtained by re-registration of a granted UK, European Patent Office (designating the UK), Malaysian or Singapore patent. Re-registration application had to be made within three years of receiving the original grant. The application was not examined, but merely advertised for opposition.

Korea

Korea’s Fair Trade Commission on 17 January 2012 published a new antitrust guidelines on patent licensing . The new guidelines aim to protect the bargaining power of SMEs that license the right to use patents owned by large businesses. It outlines 10 potentially abusive practices are explained how they can restrict competition.

Japan

The Supreme Court on 2 February 2012 made its first ruling on the meaning on publicity rights and clarified such rights. In Japan, there is no express legal basis for publicity rights, though it is generally recognised.

Pink Lady, a duo well known in the 1970s sued the publisher of the magazine “Jyosei-Jishin” for compensatory damages due to the alleged infringement of their publicity rights. The duo claimed that the publisher violated their exclusive rights by using their name and images in the magazine without their consent.

The Supreme Court held that publicity rights are rights to use a prominent figure’s promotional powers exclusively, and an infringement of publicity right will be recognised if the person’s image and name is used for free riding on their promotional value. The Supreme Court acknowledged however that use of a prominent person’s name and image for topical news, op-ed pieces, literary works and so on are legitimate exercise of the right of freedom of expression. In the end, it was held that use of the Pink Lady’s name and image to relive an era when they were popular was not an abuse or infringement.

Malaysia

The Malaysian Government is serious about improving domestic intellectual property enforcement. The Ministry of Domestic Trade, Cooperative and Consumerism recently set up a database for trademark owners to register themselves, so that they get priority in the initiation of Enforcement Actions and prosecution of trademark infringement cases. The scheme has been called the “basket of brands”. It is hoped that this new system will help to rid the market of counterfeit goods, by “placing genuine brands in the basket”.

Philippines

All intellectual property disputes are handled by the Philippines Bureau of Legal Affairs. Three hearings are set to determine whether mediation is the best way to resolve the dispute. The Intellectual Property Office recently announced that it had its 100th successful mediation.

Thailand

The Cabinet on 22 February 2012 approved a draft amendment to the Copyright Act. The amendments seek to create new penalties and exceptions to certain acts of infringement.

Overall, efforts made to improve the enforcement of intellectual property rights in Thailand is paying off. The Royal Thai Police have been carrying out raids with a lot of success. The table below shows the seizures that took place between January 2011-December 2011.

 

Relevant Law	Arrests (Cases)	Number of Counterfeit Products Seized
Copyright Act B.E. 2537	3,147	667,721
Trademark Act B.E. 2534	2,210	1,668,556
Patent Act B.E. 2522	5	129
Motion Picture and Video Act B.E. 2551	34	31,271
Customs Act B.E. 2469	576	290,119
Total	5,972	2,657,796

Source: Office of Intellectual Property Enforcement of the Department of Intellectual Property Updated Information: 31 December 2011

 

From your legal fashionista,