Wednesday, March 7, 2012
China's trademark system baffles foreign firms (Reuters)
About three weeks ago I had blogged about the troubles Apple was having over the use of the "iPad" name in China. Here's an interesting article in from Reuters that discusses the complexities of the Chinese Trademark system and how it's even baffling Facebook as it contemplates reentering the Chinese market. The story is even more interesting in light of a report issued by Thomas Reuters that shows that China became the world's top patent filer in 2011, surpassing the United States and Japan. This is the first time that any country has surpassed the US in the number of patent filings. I bet China will not only expect but demand that its IP be protected worldwide. The situation reminds me of something Colonel Potter once said in the US hit TV series M*A*S*H "Just remember, there's a right way and a wrong way to do everything and the wrong way is to keep trying to make everybody else do it the right way."
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Innovation
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Commenting on my own blog :)
ReplyDeleteI just read a very refreshing blog entry on HBR by Clyde Prestowitz titled "Don't Get Tough with China, Get Even." As the title suggests, he recommends that no matter how tough we get with China, we're never going to get them to play fairly because they are NOT playing the same game as we are! The United States is playing free-market free-trade capitalism while China is playing mercantilist state capitalism. Or to put it another way, China is playing football while America plays tennis and acts like China is, too. The U.S. keeps trying to show (in endless bilateral discussions) the Chinese how to hold the racquet, and when the Americans get tackled in the midst of their tennis lesson they scream: "Unfair play!"
This would almost be too funny if it weren't for the fact it is actually true and very sad. When will the US make China "fess up" to the height of its hypocrisy?