In early June, days before the 10th anniversary of Hong Kong's return to motherland, our China Intellectual Property News reporters interviewed Director Stephen Selby, Hong Kong Intellectual Property Department (HKIPD) at his office. Selby said that a unique and fully functional IPR system has been nurtured in Hong Kong since its handover.  The IPR system is running in the right groove which gives rise to Hong Kong's increasing reputation as an effective IPR protector.

 

Selby guided us in a decade journey encompassing the evolution of Hong Kong's IPR legislations, IPR enforcement and public education. According to the statistic, HKIPD has been seeing across-the-board hikes in filings and registrations of trademark, patent and design in the past 10 years.  The numbers for filings and registrations of trademark for 1997 were 18,529 and 12,680.  In 2006, they jumped to 22,994 and 17,907.  In the category of standard patent, the numbers for filings and grants for 1997 were mere three digits, 842 and 147.  Those figures leapfrogged to 13,790 and 5,147 in 2006.  Getting itself on the full alert for possible infringements of Olympic IPRs in Hong Kong, HKIPD set up a special unit dealing with the subject.

2007-07-04

2007-07-04