Stephen Yang of Peksung Intellectual Property assesses the
advantages offered to applicants by new provisions relating to the
utility model system.
Invention, utility model and design are the three types of
patent rights available in China. Chinese Patent Law and the
Implementing Regulations include interesting provisions related to
protecting the same invention-creation using both the invention
patent and utility model patent.
These provisions seem to have raised awareness of the Chinese
utility model among applicants, especially foreign applicants in
the past two years. According to statistics from the State
Intellectual Property Office (SIPO), utility model applications
filed by foreign applicants increased by 36% from 2009 to 2010 and
60.3% from 2010 to 2011, even though they still account for a very
small percentage (0.7%) of all utility model applications filed. In
comparison, invention applications from foreign applicants
increased by 14.8% and 12.7%
