Discussion On Indirect Patent Infringement

The Patent Law of the People's Republic of China came into force on March 12, 1983. And it has been amended twice in 1992 and 2000 respectively. Since then, tremendous changes have taken place both at home and abroad. At present, the Patent Law is faced up with lots of new problems. In order to keep up with the further economic development both at home and abroad, the State Council plans to amend the Patent Law for the third time. In the recent years, the awareness of law has been strengthened in public and the means of patent infringement are varied. The indirect infringement cases of patent rights are increased quickly. Pursuant to the current Patent Law, only the making, using or selling of the patented products constitute patent infringement. Thus, the patent rights of the patentees can not be protected. Therefore, before the amending, many scholars suggested that the relevant regulations on indirect patent infringement be added to the Patent Law. In this article, the author makes a detailed analysis on the indirect patent infringement. Since this issue is one of the most difficult and sophisticated patent problems, the analysis about the indirect patent infringement is helpful to the practice.The author uses the way of the comparative method, the inductive method, and the deductive method to analyze and discuss in details on the concept, possible types, fault principle of the indirect patent infringement. First, under the Chinese Patent Law, there are no relevant regulations on indirect patent infringement, the law courts deal with indirect patent infringement cases in accordance with the concept of contributory...