Recently, IP-related government departments in China have made constant moves and taken a number of new measures. They are so busy with revising laws and regulations on patent, trademark, copyright, and anti-unfair competition for industrialization of technological achievements, developing various plans and standards, establishing IP bases and demonstration cities, publishing new regulations and bans, etc. IP has been given high priority by relevant government departments, which should be good news for the whole industry. However, certain practices of government departments call in many questions. The moves that are criticized mostly include, "expansion of department power in major law revision," and, "overly refined income distribution mechanism in the Employment Invention Regulation (Regulation)."
Since its first draft was published, the Regulation has been questioned by academic and business communities. The draft encourages innovation and clearly provides that inventors should get returns from their intellectual achievements, which do not cause concerns. However, people criticize that the "visible hand" of the government stretches so long that it excessively intervenes in resource allocation and corporate self-management behaviors, which ought to be adjusted by the "invisible hand" of the market. In the cover story of this issue, China IP gathers the controversial provisions in the Regulation as well as views and opinions from the legislative organ, enterprise with advanced IP management, renowned legal experts and other parties, aiming to present the readers with the ultimate purposes, principles and specific provisions of the Regulation.
"Intangible" and "private" are the natural attributes of IP. The best environment for IP development and utilization is a market economy, which is dominated by market-orientated resource allocation. It is definitely not the best way for government departments to do the so-called guiding, encouraging or forcing measures to achieve the goal of enhancing IP capabilities of enterprises.
Market issues should be returned to the market, as the market mechanism will stimulate enterprises to maximize the ability and vitality of innovation. The government should be a good service provider and supervisor, but must not reach out its hand everywhere. It is not difficult to imagine the consequences brought by a visible hand that manages the intangible issues.
