China makes efforts to protect Olympic IPR

WATCH VIDEO

Source: CCTV.com | 10-20-2007 09:16

As the 2008 Beijing Games approaches, the government has been working to create a sound environment for intellectual property. On Friday, the director of the State Intellectual Property Office said the country has done a lot to protect Olympic IPR.

The country implemented a law to protect the Olympic symbol beginning April first, 2002. Later, the State Intellectual Property Office and other related departments enacted a series of follow-up regulations.

Tian Lipu said aside from creating the relevant laws, the government has also strictly enforced them.

Tian Lipu, Director of State Intellectual Property Office, said, "There have been some cases of the counterfeiting of Olympic mascots, Olympic franchise products, but they haven't been very serious. The government believes that it has been well-protecting the IPR of Olympic products and providing a good environment for the opening of the Beijing Olympic Games."

Tian said the number of foreign patent applications has grown by ten percent each year. And he believes this demonstrates well that foreign businesses are confident about China's ability to protect IPR.

Tian said, "Many multinationals from developed countries have gotten solid returns from applying for IPR in China, because the Chinese government is now able to protect their intellectual property rights."

China accepted the first IPR application in 1985. The past five years have witnessed tremendous growth in applications. The amount of patent applications has exceeded the total of the previous 16 years. From 2002 to 2006, the country accepted nearly 2 million applications.

China accepts the third largest number of patent applications in the world, after Japan and the US.

Editor:Zhang Ning