The China/Australia Free Trade Agreement may change that – the Top 6 picks.

If you own valuable IP, doing business in China has always been laced with a fear that whatever you produce may be counterfeited and there'll be nothing much you can do about it.

We're not sure that's necessarily going to change, but the new China/Australia Free Trade Agreement may give us a little more protection and rights than we currently have in China.

There's no use reading the whole thing . . . it's boring. So we've distilled the Top 6 changes that mean protecting your IP in China may be a fairer prospect (all of these already exist in Australia).

Here they are.

  1. New criminal penalties for counterfeiting and pirating of IP.
  2. Customs seizures for suspected counterfeit goods.
  3. Treatment of Australians at the same level as the Chinese in respect of registration and enforceability.
  4. Trade mark, design and patent searches on the internet. No joke, you can't do that at the moment.
  5. Protection for well known trade marks.
  6. Written reasons to be provided and a chance to appeal any rejection of IP registration.

The Agreement is yet to come into force, but that seems only a matter of time. Hopefully the final legislative version won't be watered down. Decent IP protection is a necessity for all but the foolishly brave.

We do not disclaim anything about this article. We're quite proud of it really.