View of INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS: U. S. VERSUS CHINESE PERSPECTIVE...

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VOLUME: 08, Special Issue 04, (ICESD-2021), Paper id-IJIERM-VIII-IV, June 2021

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INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS: U. S. VERSUS CHINESE PERSPECTIVE...

Dr. Mahesh Joshi

Asst. Professor, St Paul Institute of Professional Studies, Indore 1 INTRODUCTION

Imagine the Nike without the swoosh, Mc Donald’s without no golden arches or apple without trademarks. Patents can make or break a company. Most of the inventions that power the modern would start out as an idea which was eventually patented. Over the past decade, there has been an explosion of patents from companies and inventions hoping to carve out their own slice of the digital age.

Sen. Chris coons (senator from Delaware, US) has recently quoted “we are on the cusp of truly & extraordinarily revolutionary technologies. Intellectual property is turning into key battleground between the world’s biggest economic powers. China accounts for more than 10% of all trademark’s application filed in the US. We now have a pure competition in China and we are at a critical moment for the future of intellectual property”.

More than 14 million trademark applications were filed worldwide in 2019-20 up almost 160 percent from 2009-2010. At the same duration more than 3.2 million patent applications were filled.

2 PATENTS AND UTILITY MODELS

The top five countries accounted for 84.7% of the world total

2.1 Trademarks

Percentage shares of total trademark filing activity by the top five Countries, 2019

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At the same time patent applications have surge more than 70% in the US alone.

Intellectual property intensive industries contribute millions of dollars to the economy Every year so what make trade marks & Patents so valuable and why are US and China competing for their?

3 WHY TRADEMARK AND PATENTS ARE SO VALUABLE

Intellectual property or IP refers to Patents, trademarks and copyrights. Inventions work of art, music, lyrics and logos are all example of IP. What the patent system does is to create a perpetual innovation mechanism or a competitive system that forever creates more & more innovation. In the R1 category of intellectual property in the US they give inventors exclusive right for up to 20 years to make & sell a product that offers a new solution to a problem, prescription drugs are good example. Once a company’s Patent for the drug expires competitors can copy and produce the generic that includes the same ingredients.

Thus, inventors get a monopoly over their invention for a short period of time to recover this investment cost. For Entrepreneurs, investors and businesses, patent and trademarks are the life hood of innovation. They can help turn on idea into reality and generate millions of dollars in returns.

The second category of IP is trademarks. Logo’s slogans and brand names for a company or individual are all trademarks. The most well-known trademarks come from Coca-Cola, the soda maker trademarked its signature logo in 1893 and it does distinguish cans and bottles around the world ever since. Trademarks are used to establish standard for brands for consumers. So, every time one buys a coke, he/she knows its taste and quality to expect trademarks As Long as companies file periodic renewals and continue to sell their goods and services trademark will last forever. Then there are copyrights they protect original Works By authors or artist songs photographs or novels are all subject to copyright law stop copyright protects works of art. So, think of an entire movie you cannot just copy a movie and sell it. That is why you see the big warning when you start a DVD.

Anyone who has an idea for an invention except for employees at the patent and Trademark office can file an application for a patent. Unlike trademarks you don't even have to show that you are selling the product one of the main points of the patent system is to encourage innovation from those who otherwise wouldn’t do it. IPs can help turn an idea into reality and generate millions of dollars in Returns.

The trade mark help boost brand royalty and find of imitators. the smaller the company are, the more important the company are, the more important the Tm is because if you are really catch fire with something that is the only thing which is going to differentiate you from someone that has a lot of money that can put out a nearly identical product.

Trademark applications in the US have roughly doubled over the past decade as companies plan growing importance on the brands and online sales. The digital economy has also contributed to a surge in patient applications especially in fields like computer technology.

Many of today’s biggest innovations on in the form of software, machine learning or artificial intelligence. Instead of tangible physical objects this makes evaluating Patents harder. Patent’s provider want to make sure that there are actual practical inventions that have a technical character.

Tech companies are capitalizing on intellectual property slights for computers, smart devices & software. Qualcomm (California -US based chipmaker), for example generator a large portion of its sales by licensing Patent. Tech Giants like IBM. Samsung, Microsoft and apple apply for thousands of Patents every year. patent have the ability to play a vital role in the economy.

4 FRAUDULENT TRADE MARK

However wrong use of patents can also a huge amount of damage. some peoples, companies and even countries are trying to stretch the legal limits. When it comes to cashing in on IP.

The rise of fraudulent trademarks is one of the biggest concerns for law makers.

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US policy makers are overwhelmed with applications in recent years with many coming from China. US has raised concern. Over this, claiming that a lot of these applications on fraudulent.

Barton Beebe, professor at VYU, testified about the growing number of fraudulent Chinese trademark a application in the US and estimated that about 67% of the trade mark application from China in the apparel goods category in 2017 were fraudulent. but the problem is such applications clog up the system. In the light of the same issue, the US patent and trademark office implemented a new trade in august 2019, that requires any foreign company registering for a trade mark to use US license attorney.

4.1 Fight for IP U.S. V/S China

As the data in the above table shows China's push for trademarks in the US is just one example of a bigger fight over IP between the world's two biggest economics. As part of China's Rapid economic development, the U. S. government has perused policy like force technology transfer which required foreign company to share the technology. What that really means is U. S. will give Chinese companies five or ten years to sell their products to its more than 5 billion consumers but 10 or 20 years from now that technology is going to be manufactured in U. S. by U. S. companies and then exported to the rest of the world.

Many American business leaders raised concern over policies like force technology transfer, it has resulted in IP theft posing a major risk for businesses.

2018 report by the IP Commission estimated IP theft from China and other countries cost to the US economy between 225 billion dollar and 600 billion dollar per year. Over the last at least 30 years it is one of the single greatest transfers of wealth from one country to another. The intellectual property theft that has occurred between the United State and China is at historical scale. That is why it is a key sticking point in the trade war between the us and China the agreement they both signed recently includes groundbreaking provisions in an area of critical importance to the United State protecting intellectual property. The phase one trade agreement between the two countries pledged stronger protection against patent and Trademark infringement. But how it will be imposed remains to be seen. Intellectual property theft has been a major source of contention between the United States and China and really is the most important unresolved issue in the current trade dispute not only for these two countries but for the whole world. Politicians, policymakers, academics and investors say economic success will be determined by who owns and develop new technologies like artificial Intelligence and 5G. China has made it no secret, it aims to be the Global leader in these Technologies and intellectual property is the key to that goal of the 3 million patent applications filed worldwide in 2019-20. China accounted for roughly half it's made in China 2025 industrial policy funnels investment in areas like information technology and high-tech robots. Imagine if instead of Facebook, Amazon and Google all being American companies with American headquarters and mostly American employees. If all those companies in those technologies were Chinese developed, Chinese owned and Chinese LED all that additional wealth and opportunity and influence on the world stage goes to China rather than the United States that is exactly the competition that both these countries are in the middle right now.

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REFERENCES

1. Beebe, Barton and Fromer, Jeanne C., Fake Trademark Specimens: An Empirical Analysis (March 17, 2020). Columbia Law Review Forum, Vol. 121, p. 217 (2020), NYU Law and Economics Research Paper No. 20-37, NYU School of Law, Public Law Research Paper No. 20-37,

2. Patterson W. (2020). Delaware U. S. Senate mired in controversy. The review, (Oct 28, 2020) 3. Savage L. (2020). Sen. Chris Fiona's defense of vaccine apartheid is obscene. Jacobin, (12), 35-41.