Jerry Xia / Wen Zou / Anbi Xu
Recently, the Shanghai Intellectual Property Court (SIPC) rendered a so-called partial or interlocutory judgment during a patent infringement lawsuit filed by the French automotive parts manufacturer Valeo against three Chinese defendants including Xiamen Lucas Automotive Parts Co., Ltd., Xiamen Fuke Automotive Parts Co., Ltd. and an individual Mr. Chen (hereinafter collectively referred to as “the defendants”). In this case, Valeo alleged that the wipers for cars being manufactured and sold by the defendants have infringed its Chinese invention patent named “Connectors for wiper of motor vehicles and corresponding connecting devices” and on that basis, they requested RMB 6M for damages. After careful investigation with support of technical experts, the SIPC found that the defendants’ products have indeed fallen into the scope of Claims 1-3 and 6-10 of Valeo’s patent in question and hence should immediately stop the infringement first while the damages can be determined later.
It’s said that this is the first time the SIPC has made such a partial judgment for an IP case. The legal basis is Article 153 of the Civil Procedure Law of PRC: “If some of the facts in a case being tried by the people’s court are already evident, the court may pass judgment on that part of the case first.”
Authored by Jerry Xia <jerryxia@anjielaw.com> , Wen Zou <zouwen@anjielaw.com> , Anbi Xu <xuanbi@anjielaw.com> at AnJie Law Firm