A patent law that recently marked its 30th anniversary has bolstered foreign investment, technology and innovation.

In the past three decades the Patent Law of China has been key in stimulating and protecting innovation.

The National People's Congress Standing Committee Vice Chairman, Chen Zhu, said the law "has played a crucial role in boosting the nation's economic and social development."

"The central government has attached an unheard-of importance to it in recent years, and requires integrating the implementation of the law into the establishment of a national innovation system to meet the demand for an innovation-driven country," he said.

Chen said putting the patent law into action was a long and difficult task. He suggested keeping an eye on the international intellectual property rules to improve the Chinese patent system.

Shen Changyu, commissioner of the State Intellectual Property Office, said China's tech innovation and patent commercialization capabilities had advanced significantly due to continuous improvements in the system.

The patent law has been amended three times to adjust to economic reforms and demands of globalization. A fourth revision is now underway.

New modes for the use of patents have also been created and include a patent pool, insurance and auction, Shen said.

"Bottlenecks still exist, such as the lack of high-valued and promising patents and weaker ability in patent information public service", he said.

Shen said these areas would now be the main focus.

Tian Lipu, head of the China Intellectual Property Society, said the patent law "enlightened the sense of innovation of Chinese people and helped boost the nation's economic growth. More importantly, the law itself can be considered a kind of productivity".

Zhen Caiji, president of Datang Telecom Group, called for an environment that has greater respect for creativity and guarantees fulfillment of IP values to help Chinese companies compete globally.

He also suggested tech companies that intend to go abroad "learn more about the related international rules".

The number of annual patent applications in the country has grown from about 14,300 30 years ago to about 2.4 million today.

Last year China was global leader for the highest number of invention patent applications for three consecutive years.

It also had more than 21,000 international patent applications filed through the Patent Cooperation Treaty, ranking third worldwide.

The patent ownership per 10,000 Chinese residents reached 4.02 by the end of 2013, beyond the goal of 3.3 set at the end of the 12th Five-Year Plan (2010-15).

haonan@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily 04/02/2014 page17)