Business Background
Established in September 2009, Wuxi LerTech Co., Ltd. (“the Client”), as a Chinese high-tech enterprise with more than twenty patented technologies, has outstanding advantages in the field of magnetic sensor chip design and production. The Client filed a lawsuit in 2019 against MultiDimension Technology Co., Ltd. (“MultiDimension”) in Jiangsu for infringement of the Client’s patent, demanding MultiDimension to stop the infringement and pay for the damage. In 2020, however, MultiDimension claimed to the court that the patent belonged to its former employee Jianming BAI as a service invention-creation. Attorney Meihua ZHOU was instructed by the Client to provide full-service as a litigation representative. After analyzing the relationship between Jianming BAI and MultiDimension, attorney ZHOU found a breakthrough point, which helped the Client to win the case.
Business Highlights and Difficulties
Keenly Identify Vulnerability in Documents and Reverse the Passive Situation.
In the first instance, MultiDimension provided sufficient evidence and successfully persuaded the judge that the patent should belong to Jianming BAI. Therefore, it was very challenging for the lawyer to change the sentence in the second instance. Through an in-depth analysis of the contract documents signed between Jianming BAI and MultiDimension, attorney ZHOU’s team found that there was no employment relationship, but a cooperative relationship between university and enterprise which reversed the Client’s passive position in litigation and convinced the judge changing the original sentence.
A Benchmark Case to Clarify the Attribution of Service Invention-Creation
Apart from the above lawsuit, MultiDimension had also filed a series of suits against the Client, striving for the right of six other patents. The victory in this case prompted MultiDimension to voluntarily settle with the Client on the rest of the case, allowing the Client to maintain the ownership of its core patent rights. Additionally, as the case involved the cooperation between universities and enterprises related to industry, academia and research, it was important to correctly identifying the attribution of service invention-creation. Above all, this case provided valuable practical experience for handling the similar cases in the future.
