Improving quality and increasing efficiency： igniting a new engine for building a strong intellectual property country
-Strive to realize the transformation of patent creation from quantity and speed to quality and efficiency.
This is a five-year race against time, and this is a five-year struggle.
Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the CPC Central Committee with the Supreme Leader as the core has grasped the general trend of the times, insisted on improving the quality and efficiency of development as the center, and led China to enhance its motivation and cultivate its advantages in solving the development problems, and constantly advance in a higher quality, more efficient, fairer and more sustainable direction.
On May 9-10, 2014, General Secretary of the Supreme Leader put forward the strategic idea of "three transformations" during his inspection tour in Henan, that is, to "strive to achieve major breakthroughs in advantageous areas, common technologies and key technologies, and promote the transformation from China manufacturing to China creation, from China speed to China quality, and from China products to China brand". This important exposition, which is closely related to intellectual property rights, pointed out the direction for the development of intellectual property rights and immediately triggered a warm response in the national intellectual property system.
In a series of important documents subsequently issued by the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, the quality of intellectual property rights is clearly required. The Action Plan for Further Implementing the National Intellectual Property Strategy (2014-2020) issued at the end of 2014 pointed out that it is necessary to further increase the ownership of intellectual property rights, promote the obvious optimization of the intellectual property structure, and substantially increase core patents, well-known brands, copyright products and excellent new plant varieties. At the end of 2015, "Several Opinions of the State Council on Accelerating the Construction of Intellectual Property Power under the New Situation" further clarified that it is necessary to enhance the added value and international influence of intellectual property rights, implement patent quality improvement projects, and cultivate a number of core patents. The patent quality improvement project has also become the only project explicitly implemented in this document. At the end of 2016, in the "Thirteenth Five-Year Plan for the Protection and Utilization of Intellectual Property Rights" issued by the State Council, "improving the quality and efficiency of intellectual property rights" once again became one of the key tasks in the "Thirteenth Five-Year Plan" period.
"We must conscientiously implement the spirit of the important instructions of the Supreme Leader General Secretary, promote a higher level of creation, pay more attention to the quality of patents, realize the transformation from quantity and speed to quality and efficiency, and encourage innovative subjects to create more basic patents, original patents, core patents and high-value patents." At the 3rd Beijing Invention Patent Awards Conference held on May 15th, 2014, Shen Changyu, director of China National Intellectual Property Administration, who was invited to attend the conference, pointed out.
From quantitative accumulation to qualitative leap; From the breakthrough of point to the improvement of system capability. In the past five years, the national intellectual property system has thoroughly studied the spirit of the 18th CPC National Congress and the Third, Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Plenary Sessions of the 18th CPC Central Committee, fully implemented the spirit of the series of important speeches by the Supreme Leader General Secretary and the new ideas, new ideas and new strategies for governing the country, firmly established and earnestly practiced the new development concept of innovation, coordination, green, openness and sharing, promoted the coordinated development of patent quality and quantity, and strived to form a "pyramid" with both foundations, plateaus and peaks.
Strengthening the quality orientation of patent application and consolidating the foundation of patent creation
In the past five years, based on the existing foundation and development needs, China National Intellectual Property Administration has established the work orientation of "quality wins, quantity distribution". While continuing to maintain a steady increase in the number of patents, it has put more energy into improving the quality of patents, stabilizing growth, adjusting structure and promoting transformation, and consolidating the foundation of patent creation with practical measures.
-Steady growth means to keep the speed of patent growth in a reasonable range, neither too fast nor too slow, neither too big nor too small, and strive for progress steadily.
-Adjusting the structure means adjusting the proportion of invention patents, utility model patents and design patents, and constantly increasing the proportion of invention patents with high technology content.
-promoting transformation, on the one hand, promoting the transformation of patents with relatively low technology content to patents with relatively high technology content, and striving to achieve breakthroughs in key areas and core technologies; On the other hand, it is to promote the transformation of patents with uncertain market prospects to patents with clear market prospects, highlighting the market value orientation of patents.
There are many factors that affect the quality of patent, among which the quality of patent application is the most important. In 2014, China National Intellectual Property Administration issued "Several Opinions on Further Improving the Quality of Patent Application", which optimized the evaluation index system of regional patent work and further highlighted the patent application quality orientation of regional patent evaluation work.
"Shanghai insists on highlighting key areas and directions, making efforts to increase the number of effective patents and invention patents in Shanghai, encouraging overseas patent applications, promoting the transformation and application of patent achievements and boosting the development of strategic emerging industries in Shanghai." The relevant person in charge of the Shanghai Intellectual Property Office said that while improving the quality of patent applications, Shanghai focused on supporting the development of strategic emerging industries and cultural and creative industries, which strongly supported the construction of Shanghai Science and Technology Innovation Center.
"Policies set up platforms and enterprises as the main body to promote the patent work of enterprises from quantity increase to quality improvement, resulting in qualitative change." Yu Zhiyong, director of the Intellectual Property Office of Shandong Province, said that in recent years, Shandong Province has adhered to the principle of "quality wins, quantity layout" in patent creation, and constantly strengthened the quality orientation. The number of high-quality invention patent applications from enterprises has been increasing, which has effectively promoted the transformation and upgrading of industrial structure, thus promoting economic and social development.
In the past five years, local intellectual property management departments have made great efforts to improve the patent evaluation index system, optimize policies, strengthen supervision, and strengthen the quality orientation of patent applications, and achieved outstanding results. The Report on the Status of National Patent Strength in 2016 evaluated the patent quality in all parts of China for the first time. The results show that the comprehensive strength of national patents has been steadily improved, and patents have been well matched with scientific and technological innovation and industrial development in many regions, which has improved the quality of regional innovation and development.
Implementing patent quality improvement project and casting the soul of patent quality
Improving patent quality involves the whole chain of patent creation, application, agency, examination, protection and application, which is a complex system and a long-term work. With this in mind, in 2016, China National Intellectual Property Administration conscientiously implemented the new development concept put forward by the Central Committee, earnestly implemented the decision-making arrangements of a series of important documents of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, formulated and implemented the patent quality improvement project, formulated a series of targeted measures around the whole chain of patent work, and made efforts to achieve high-level creation, high-quality application, high-efficiency examination and high-efficiency application in the patent field.
-Strengthen policy guidance. Guide and urge local governments to improve the quality-oriented patent policy, reflect the support orientation of invention patent authorization, and change from promoting the increase of patent quantity to mainly promoting the improvement of patent quality. To this end, China National Intellectual Property Administration has also improved the statistical caliber of patents and the way of publishing data, which reflects the factors of patent quality more and guides local governments to pay more attention to patent quality.
"The purpose of adjusting the disclosure content of patent statistical data is to further improve the quality of patents and give better play to the innovation-oriented role of patent statistical indicators." The relevant person in charge of the Planning and Development Department of China National Intellectual Property Administration said that the adjustment of the disclosure content of patent statistics is conducive to guiding applicants to make rational use of the patent system, reflecting the innovation level and ability more truly, optimizing the allocation of patent examination resources and improving the level of scientific decision-making.
-Efforts should be made to improve the quality of patent examination. On the one hand, China National Intellectual Property Administration established a patent examination quality evaluation group, an abnormal patent application monitoring group and a patent examination quality social information feedback working group, hired a patent examination quality supervisor, and strengthened the organizational guarantee of examination quality; On the other hand, we should further improve the guidance system and quality assurance system for patent examination, compile quality assurance manuals for examination of invention patents, PCT international patent applications and invalid reexamination, establish a hierarchical and phased quality assurance system, strengthen the implementation of patent examination standards, and strictly control the authorization of patent examination. According to the survey results on the quality of patent examination commissioned by a third party in China National Intellectual Property Administration in recent years, the user’s satisfaction with the quality of patent examination has been in the "satisfactory" range since 2010.
In the past five years, patent examination has achieved remarkable results. A total of 2.363 million applications for invention patents, 4.383 million applications for utility model patents and 2.739 million applications for design patents were concluded, which were 2.5 times, 3.0 times and 1.6 times that of the previous five years respectively; 90,000 cases of requests for reexamination were closed, and 15,000 cases of requests for invalidation were closed, which were 2.7 times and 1.3 times of the previous five years, respectively; 135,000 PCT international searches were completed, 2.1 times that of the previous five years. In sharp contrast to the amount of examination, the patent examination cycle has been steadily declining. The actual examination cycle of invention patents has been shortened from 22.6 months before 2012 to 22 months in 2016, the closing cycle of utility model patents and design patents is 3 months, and the closing cycles of re-examination requests and invalidation requests are 11.9 months and 5.1 months respectively.
-Efforts should be made to improve the quality of patent agency. On the one hand, we should further improve the supervision mechanism of patent agency industry, introduce competition mechanism, increase the disclosure of professional integrity information of agencies and agents, tighten industry supervision, strengthen industry self-discipline, and promote the improvement of patent agency quality and service level. On the other hand, we should establish an interview system for patent agencies’ abnormal applications, feed back the quality evaluation information of patent agencies in time, interview patent agencies and places with abnormal applications in time, and punish those with serious circumstances according to the law and regulations.
In 2015, China National Intellectual Property Administration specially revised the Measures for the Administration of Patent Agencies, established a publicity system for annual reports of patent agencies, and fully implemented the "double random and one open" supervision. In particular, in view of the business chaos in the agency industry, such as the patent agency qualification certificate "hanging certificate", we organized a special rectification of the patent agency industry, severely cracked down on the "hanging certificate" behavior, and successively verified 230 unqualified institutions, effectively purifying the patent agency market and standardizing the business order of the industry.
Optimize the patent incentive and support policies to lift the wings of innovation and development.
"Eye of the Sky" sounding, "Dragon" sounding, Shenzhou flying, high-speed rail Mercedes-Benz, Beidou networking, the first flight of large aircraft … In a number of major projects distributed in high-end equipment, strategic emerging industries, information technology and other aspects, the "gold content" of patents is fully manifested.
"As a key intellectual property demonstration enterprise in Zhongguancun, Beijing Spacecraft General Design Department has always adhered to the principle of’ equal emphasis on quantity and quality’ in patent layout, carried out patent analysis and layout in the development of major projects such as navigation and lunar exploration, and realized more than 400 patent layouts to ensure that core key technologies have independent intellectual property rights." Yang Hui, chief designer of Beidou navigation satellite, introduced it at the 18th China Patent Awards Conference. The data shows that in 2016, the number of new applications for core technology patents in the aerospace field exceeded 200, and the number of patents granted reached 773, ranking first in the industry.
After 18 sessions of precipitation and accumulation, the China Patent Award has played an important role in inspiring the innovation enthusiasm of the whole society, enhancing China’s independent innovation capability, optimizing the patent structure and improving the quality of independent intellectual property rights. In the recent five China Patent Awards since 2012, a total of 100 patent gold awards, 25 design gold awards, 2081 patent excellence awards and 283 design excellence awards were selected. The patent of "Quantitative Calculation Method of Oil and Gas Saturation in Fractured Reservoirs" by China Petroleum and Natural Gas Co., Ltd. originally proposed a scientific method for calculating fracture saturation, which solved the long-standing technical problems in the field of natural gas exploration and development in China. The patent of "Molecular Composite Melamine Cyanurate Flame Retardant, Its Preparation Method and Use" of Sichuan University has overcome the bottleneck of traditional melamine cyanurate synthesis, such as high viscosity, long reaction time, complex process and catalyst residue … These award-winning projects not only meet the major needs of the country, but also have a high level of technological innovation, and at the same time have produced remarkable economic and social benefits through effective patent protection and application. According to statistics, since the "Twelfth Five-Year Plan", only the patent gold award projects have achieved new sales of 622.1 billion yuan and new profits of 131.7 billion yuan, which shows the contribution of the China Patent Award to economic and social development.
The pace of the times has always become more and more solid in constantly crossing difficulties and obstacles. To explore the course of struggle, there must be an endless source of strength. With the surging momentum of "quality and quantity rising together", China is accelerating its progress from a big intellectual property country to a strong intellectual property country. (Intellectual Property News reporter Wang Yu)
Tracing the source and draining, keeping steady and far-reaching
Innovation is the new engine of development, and intellectual property creation is the igniter to start the engine. Looking back on the development process of reform and opening up in the past 40 years, China’s intellectual property cause has made remarkable achievements, and the number of patents has been increasing. Especially in the five years since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the number of invention patent applications in China has maintained an average annual growth rate of more than 10%, ranking first in the world for many years, and successfully ranking among the intellectual property powers.
However, we are also soberly aware that although China is a big intellectual property country, it is not yet a strong intellectual property country. The contradiction of "big but not strong, many but not excellent" intellectual property rights is more prominent, and basic, original and high-value core patents are relatively insufficient. Promoting the coordinated development of patent quality and quantity and accelerating the transformation from a big intellectual property country to a strong intellectual property country are major issues facing the intellectual property system.
Intellectual property rights, especially invention patents, are important indicators to measure and evaluate a country’s innovation level. Practice tells us that the real core key technology cannot be bought with money, and it is unreliable to rely on imported equipment. It is not far to take the road of introducing imitation. Only by holding the core technology and intellectual property rights in our own hands can we truly grasp the initiative of competition and development.
Patent quality is one of the core indicators to highlight the quality and benefit of innovation-driven development, the lifeline to ensure the sustained and healthy development of intellectual property, and the foundation to consolidate the construction of a strong intellectual property country. Only by improving the quality of patents can we further highlight the supporting role of intellectual property rights in innovation-driven development and provide more innovation impetus for China’s economic development to improve quality and efficiency.
In the whole chain of patent creation, application, agency, examination, protection and application, creation is the source. Without high-level creation, patent quality will become passive water and rootless wood. At present, China’s patent creation is transforming from the previous quantitative scale type to the quality and efficiency type. Through the implementation of the patent quality improvement project, the stages of creation, application, agency and examination are strictly controlled, and the management of patent quality is strengthened from all aspects, which effectively promotes the development of the whole chain of patent work such as protection and operation.
Consolidate the foundation of creation, cast the soul of quality, and show the ambition of leading. The continuous improvement of patent quality has not only become a magic weapon for China enterprises to improve quality and efficiency, transform and upgrade, but also become an important engine to promote industrial development and help drive innovation. We believe that China, where the quality of patents is constantly improving and the creation of intellectual property rights is increasingly active, will surely be stable and far-reaching on the road of innovation-driven development. (Intellectual Property News Guangyu)
