The Shanghai office of the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO) invited Shenmin Xu, W&B Senior Partner and Patent Attorney, to deliver a lecture entitled “IPR Management Strategies for Japanese Enterprises in China” at the Yangtze Shanghai Hotel on Feb. 23, 2016.

In his lecture in front of over a hundred Japanese companies’ representatives in China, Mr. Xu touched upon his practice experience in three sections entitled “Patented Technology Management Strategy", "Copyright Management Strategy" and "Trade Secret Protection and Management". Mr. Xu also addressed his audience in detail on diverse issues including service invention rewards, patented invention maintenance strategies and flexible application, countermeasures against legal action, common copyrights for enterprises, and management methods. The lecture provided Japanese businesses in China with effective coping measures to deal with common practical problems relating to IP.

From 1980 to 1984, Mr. Xu served as an officer with the Shanghai Branch of the State Intellectual Property Office, and he obtained his Patent Attorney qualification in 1984. In the same year he entered the Shanghai Patent and Trademark Agency, where he served as Director of the Implementation Department and the Legal Department until 1994. In 1986, Mr. Xu obtained his attorney’s license by passing China's first Bar Exam. He then pursued advanced study in Patent Law in Japan from 1987 to 1988. Mr. Xu has represented clients in numerous domestic and overseas patent applications along with hundreds of IP litigation cases involving trademark, copyright and patent infringement and licensing contract disputes. It is worth mentioning that Mr. Xu successfully represented his client in the first domestic case in which a Japanese company sued a Chinese company as well as the first domestic patent infringement case between two foreign companies.

Mr. Xu’s lecture provided a valuable distillation of the experience that Mr. Xu has accumulated during his practice, so as to positively impact IPR management in Japanese companies.