China’s National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) have issued a guidance document to further strengthen intellectual property protection in the solar industry.

The document sets key tasks for the solar industry and calls for a focus on important links in the solar industry supply chain, strengthening intellectual property protection, and enhancing risk management.

It also calls for a focus on stimulating the role of intellectual property rights in promoting the construction of a modern solar industry system and supporting the development of a manufacturing and intellectual property powerhouse.

Enhancing Patent Creation and Quality

Through the document, CNIPA and MIIT encourage enterprises to increase research and development investment; accelerate technology advancements in TOPCon, and back-contact, and heterojunction solar module technologies, and strengthen high-value patent layouts.

Solar companies must proactively reserve basic patents for advanced technologies, including perovskite and tandem batteries. The document also calls for increased innovation in inverters, key raw materials, equipment, and system components.

Patent mining and cultivation in upstream and downstream links, such as photovoltaic-energy storage integration, intelligent management systems, and integrated operation and maintenance, is encouraged as well.

Faster Patent Examination and Authorization

The guidance document encourages the solar industry to improve the efficiency of patent pre-examination and examination. It suggests leveraging national-level intellectual property protection centers to provide professional, efficient patent pre-examination services for solar enterprises.

It calls for establishing and improving intellectual property risk monitoring and early-warning mechanisms for the solar industry.

The guidance document states that guidance will be provided to enterprises to improve intellectual property compliance management, undertake patent risk analysis, and prevent and respond to potential infringement disputes.

The document also wants the relevant authorities to strengthen tracking and analysis of intellectual property risks in the industry and enhance early intervention capabilities.

CNIPA and MIIT push for the efficient handling of administrative adjudication of disputes.

Through the guidance document, they recommend that intellectual property management departments and industry and information technology departments of provinces with concentrated solar industries should establish specialized mechanisms to resolve patent disputes and handle administrative adjudication cases efficiently.

Additionally, CNIPA and MIIT  encourage establishing a cross-regional joint trial mechanism for the administrative adjudication of solar patent infringement disputes.

Increasing Cross-Agency Coordination

The guidance document supports establishing an information-sharing mechanism. This would include intellectual property management departments regularly sending copies of administrative adjudication case information to the industry, information technology authorities, state-owned assets supervision and management departments, and customs authorities.

the solar industry and information technology authorities must strictly enforce the requirements of the solar manufacturing industry standards. They must also strengthen the dynamic management of the list of enterprises that meet these standards, based on comprehensive evaluations of core patents and administrative rulings on intellectual property infringement.

Additionally, they call for strengthening customs protection of intellectual property rights to prohibit the import and export of solar products that infringe such rights.

Enhancing Mediation and Arbitration for Disputes

The guidance document calls for leveraging the country’s centralized litigation-mediation linkage mechanism to resolve intellectual property disputes in the solar industry.

It encourages regions with the necessary conditions to conduct intellectual property mediation in the solar industry through organizations such as intellectual property protection centers. They must also support industry associations and other social organizations in actively participating in the mediation of disputes involving solar enterprises.

The document encourages qualified arbitration organizations to strengthen the development of professional arbitration teams in the solar industry.

It also supports industry organizations and the issuance of self-regulatory initiatives to respect intellectual property rights.

Overseas Intellectual Property Risk Response

CNIPA and MIIT say the overseas intellectual property rights protection assistance mechanism for the solar industry must be enhanced. Intellectual property risk prevention for solar enterprises must be improved at international exhibitions, in product exports, and in overseas investments.

Solar companies must also actively cultivate a positive image for Chinese brands and build internationally influential and well-known brands. They must increase trademark protection efforts and crack down on counterfeiting of well-known trademarks and brands, as well as on malicious trademark registration applications.

Such companies must monitor overseas trademark use, work to reduce overseas trademark and domain name squatting. They must promptly and properly handle overseas intellectual property disputes.

Last September, solar module and cell manufacturers LONGi Green Energy Technology and JinkoSolar announced that they had reached a global settlement regarding ongoing patent disputes and related legal proceedings.

The last two years have witnessed a surge in intellectual property disputes with the solar industry transitioning from Mono PERC to TOPCon technology, particularly in China, Europe, and the U.S.