Foreign exchanges key to IP protection, experts say

International exchanges should be increased to explore new ways and patterns to protect intellectual property, so as to better face new problems and challenges in this field in the era of digital economy, experts said.

They made the remarks at a symposium, which was jointly hosted by the Beijing Intellectual Property Court and the Institute for International Intellectual Property of Peking University, on Friday in Beijing.

Highlighting the importance of protecting IP rights by rule of law, Yang Ming, deputy head of the institute, called for improvement of the legal framework to adapt to the new technological environment and economic development patterns under the rapid growth of the digital economy.

Kiran Patel, senior director of the China-Britain Business Council, suggested that China and the United Kingdom join hands to face challenges in the IP field and jointly build an international IP system that supports innovation on an equal footing, in order to promote bilateral cooperation and mutual benefits.

"We need to attach more importance to IP utilization and transformation, and take the initiative to participate in the implementation and development of international IP rules," said Liu Shuangyu, president of the IP court.

"With an open and inclusive attitude, we'd like to strengthen international exchanges and cooperation to continuously improve our judicial capabilities and find new ways to protect IP rights," she said, adding that they will contribute more Chinese wisdom and solutions to promoting global IP protection.

More than 30 IP and legal professionals from home and abroad attended the symposium, sharing ideas and opinions on various hot topics in the IP field, such as how to use IP rights to promote new quality productive forces, how to protect IP rights in the age of digital economy and how to facilitate reforms of the IP specialized courts.

China has stepped up efforts to strengthen IP protection over the past few years. To efficiently solve increasing IP disputes and deeply research IP-related legal problems, the country set up specialized courts to focus on the handling of relevant cases.

The Beijing IP Court, which was established in November 2014, is one of them. Besides, such IP specialized courts have also been opened in Shanghai, Guangdong province and the Hainan Free Trade Zone.