China's patent invalidation proceedings: the
statistics
In China, while patent infringement disputes are usually dealt
with by the People's Court, the determination of patent
validity is within the exclusive jurisdiction of the China National
Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA, known as the SIPO
prior to August 2018). A branch of the CNIPA, formerly known as the
Patent Re-examination Board (PRB), is responsible for handling
patent invalidation proceedings. However, according to the latest
news, after 1 April 2019 the name of PRB will no longer appear in
the decisions, instead the CNIPA will issue the decisions in its
own name.
With the rapid growth of patent applications and grants in
China, the number of invalidation requests has increased
dramatically during recent years. In 2018 5,235 invalidation
requests covering all inventions, utility models and designs were
filed with the PRB, nearly 2.5 times greater than in 2008. Among
the total, there were:
