Criminal IP cases: New ground rules

On January 10 2011, the Supreme People's Court (SPC), the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) and the Ministry of Public Security (MPS) issued a joint authoritative document entitled the Opinion on Several Issues Concerning the Application of the Law in Handling Criminal Cases of Intellectual Property Infringement (最高人民法院、最高人民检察院、公安部 关于办理侵犯知识产权刑事案件适用法律若干问题的意见) (the Opinion).

The Opinion arrived at the tail end of a nationwide six-month intellectual property (IP) enforcement campaign initiated by the Chinese central government under the guidance of Vice Premier and Politburo member Wang Qishan and the Ministry of Commerce that is due to end in March 2011. Industry sources have indicated that the campaign has been a positive one to date, particularly for the larger Chinese and multinational corporations with ongoing anti-counterfeiting programs of their own and that have been solicited for leads by enforcement authorities. There have been some indications that the said campaign may be extended, perhaps even indefinitely.