1. Patent War between Samsung and Apple, German Court dismisses application for an injunction banning the sale of the Galaxy Tab 10.1N

 

Bloomberg Communication reported on the 1^st (local time) that Samsung, which is engaging in a patent war against Apple, earned its first victory in Germany. The Munich Court dismissed on the day Apple’s application for an injunction banning the sale in Germany of Samsung’s tablet PC Galaxy 10.1N and smart phone Galaxy Nexus.

 

The lawsuit was raised by Apple last year contending that Samsung had infringed Apple’s patent for touch screen-related technology, but the court ruled in favor of Samsung saying the technology is a widely used technology. By dint of this victory, Samsung became able to take an opportunity for launching a counterattack against Apple in Germany.

 

Meanwhile, there is an appraisal that it is an incorrect strategy for Samsung to employ a standard communication technology as a weapon in a patent war against Apple. The Europe Union (EU) recently started an anti-trust investigation into whether or not Samsung abused a standard technology patent. It was pointed out that the lawsuit should have been filed against Apple for a technology that is not standard, taking into consideration the fact that it is difficult to win a patent lawsuit based on standard technology.

 

 

2. China beats U. S. to rank first in the world in patent applications

 

China beat the U. S. for the first time to rank top of the world in patent applications. Since the Chinese government concentrated its investment in cultivating creative and talented people and securing intellectual property rights, it managed to catch up with America in an instant. However, it ranks fourth after America, Japan and Germany in international patents which is an indication of the quality of patents

 

According to the announcement made by the SIPO (State Intellectual Property Office) of China on the 8^th, China filed 526,412 patent applications last year. This is an enormous increase of 35% over 391,177 applications in 2010. The statistics for the U. S. have not been announced yet, but it is estimated that about 505,000 applications with an increase of 5% compared with 2010. China has held the top position in the world for several years in the fields of trademark, design and utility models.

 

 

3. Korea’s big four groups to take joint action against patent offensives

 

Following Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics, Hyundai Motors made an investment in Intellectual Discovery (Creative Capital Co., Ltd.), a government-led company for managing intellectual property. It has been known that the SK Group, which took over Hynix, is considering an additional investment besides the Hynix share of investment. This is to defend intellectual property in earnest in types of business other than IT amidst increasing offensives by patent trolls. According to the related government agency reported on the 15th, Hyundai Motors recently secured a 12.5% share by investing 5 billion won in Intellectual Discovery. Intellectual Discovery was established in July 2010 for the purpose of protecting domestic enterprises against patent trolls.

 

 

4. The Police and the Ministry of Knowledge Economy to cooperate to prevent the leaking of industrial technology

A cooperative system on the level of government departments will be built in earnest to prevent the leaking of industrial technology and provide support for companies that have suffered damage.

 

The National Police Agency and the Ministry of Knowledge Economy Trade Action Officers held a working session in the National Policy Agency at Migeun-dong, Seoul on the 20^th to discuss how to enhance the effectiveness of investigation into industrial technology leaking and provide support for companies that have suffered damage and they decided to launch a cooperative system in earnest. At the meeting attended by five related personnel from the National Policy Agency Foreign Bureau of Investigation the Ministry of Knowledge Economy Trade Committee, the two government agencies discussed the organization of advisors for stopping unfair trade practices, sharing information on cases of technological leaking and measures for preventing infringement of business secrets.

 

 

5. Application for registering changes in intellectual property rights to become easy

 

The KIPO announced on the 23^rd that application for registering changes necessary when buying or selling intellectual property rights such as patent rights and trademark rights would become easier. ‘A prior check system for registering changes and errors (tentative name)’, whereby it is possible to know whether there were any errors in the document made before the applicant submitted the application for registering changes online, will be put into informal operation after trial operation for one month. Application for registering changes in intellectual property rights had an inconvenience of delayed processing of registration because it is difficult to prepare the document due to many and complicated laws and regulations compared to other applications such as simply registering a new invention.

 

6. Korea Bio Economy Center presents a research report analyzing the U.S. FDA guidelines

 

America is planning for biosimilar market expansion while helping late comers advance into the market in spite of the opposition of original drug manufacturers and expects a drug manufacturing cost reduction effect of about 25 billion dollars in the next 10 years. As grounds for this, actions for reducing clinical costs by relaxing the width of regulation were mentioned, such as a scheme for allowing entry easy for late comer’s through a specific, step-by-step and comprehensive process of product making, accommodation of control drugs, extrapolation of therapeutic indications, and making it possible to use diluents that are different from original products.