Cases Research On The Application Of Doctrine Of Estoppel In Pantent Infringement Litigation

With the development of science and technology of China and the innovationcapability improving gradually, our country patent application number is growing.Throughout all over the court cases, the number of the patent infringement litigation isalso on the rise, and complex.In the patent infringement litigation, the Doctrine ofEstoppel is an important principle.It is a strategy to prevent patentee renege. Inaddition to the simple rule of the supreme people’s court’s judicial interpretation, thereis no any detail perfect provisions shall be applicable. Because of the lack of relevantstandards, so the court can’t accurately apply the principle in the judicial practicedealing with patent infringement disputes.And it brings very great uncertainty, whichaffects the interests between the patentee and the public. So in this paper,I use threegroups of specific case to in-depth study the Doctrine of Estoppel in the patentinfringement litigation, to provide relevant suggestions on legislation and judicialpractice.The article contains three parts including the introduction, the main body and theconclusion.The first chapter is to select two cases as the breakthrough point, then analysisthe meaning and the value of the Doctrine of Estoppel principle. And on this basis toanalyze cases, to clarify the wrong understanding of the concept.The second chapter is also to select two cases as the breakthrough point to reflectthe problems that when deal with the relationship of the Doctrine of Estoppel and the Doctrine of Equivalents, the rule is a complete ban or elastic limit? Thencombine Chinese judicial status with abroad to put forward the author’s point of view.The third Chapter is to select two of the same case as the breakthrough point aswell, then analysis what kind of change or opinion statements to apply the principle ofthe Doctrine of Estoppel. Combined with the legislative and judicial status quo athome and abroad, put forward the author’s point of view, and on the basis to analysisthe cases.The last chapter is the conclusion part. In this chapter, the author according tothe analysis of the former three chapters,to summary how to correctly apply theDoctrine of Estoppel principle and put forward my own suggestions in patentinfringement litigation.