The Chinese New Year is generally seen by those celebrating it as a time for reflection, change and improvement. For the 2025 Chinese New Year, the China National Intellectual Property Administration (“CNIPA”) also seems to have taken the opportunity to modify its practice in relation to the evidential burden in trade mark non-use cancellation cases ..read more

The Board’s Decision In a significant precedential ruling, Plumrose Holding Ltd. v. USA Ham LLC, No. 91272970, 2025 WL 248763, at *1 (Jan. 17, 2025), the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (“Board”) has expanded protection for foreign trademark owners, ruling that a company can successfully oppose a U.S. trademark application based solely on reputational harm ..read more

On 27th November 2023, the Beijing Internet Court upheld that an AI generated work can be protected by copyright if the work reflects an author’s choice of expression and has originality (see our earlier blog post here). Almost a year later, on 18th October 2024, we now have another decision from the Changshu People’s Court ..read more

This article was co-authored by Bella Baker We live in a disrupted world. One impact from this is a gig economy that increasingly favours contractors and freelancers, allowing for more flexible working arrangements. This has also led to the growing trend of ‘portfolio careers’, with corporates and professionals taking on a range of consulting roles ..read more

Superbabies Limited (“Superbabies”) creates comics called “The Super Babies,” featuring a team of superhero babies. On May 14, 2024, Superbabies filed a heavily animated petition (“Petition”) to cancel the marks SUPER HERO (U.S. Reg. No. 8,25,835) and SUPER HEROES (U.S. Reg. Nos. 1,179,067; 1,140,452; 3,674,448) jointly owned by DC Comics (“DC”) and Marvel Characters, Inc ..read more

The digital economy is built around speed, simplicity and more efficient ways of doing things. Data security and privacy is expected but is often negotiable as consumers are enticed to trade private information for efficiency or more attractive offers. In workplaces information sharing and collaboration is more fluid than ever before, and creativity is increasingly ..read more

On 8 July 2024, the Hong Kong government launched a two-month public consultation on potential revisions to the Copyright Ordinance (Cap. 528) in view of the rapid developments in artificial intelligence (“AI”), especially generative AI. The 52-page consultation paper titled “Copyright and Artificial Intelligence” (the “Paper”) addresses the following issues relating to generative AI: The ..read more

Over the past few years, the PRC courts have witnessed a significant increase in AI-related disputes (see our previous newsletters here and here). The Beijing Internet Court’s recent decision on an AI-generated voice case further enriches the jurisprudence in this dynamic field. On 23 April 2024, the Beijing Internet Court handed down its first ruling ..read more

By Georgina Hey & Jerome Messiha Content developers and creatives are generators of ideas and concepts. The point at which any concept transforms into a copyright protected work is often a vexed issue in the creative (and other) spaces. A recent Australian case, Duncan v ABC [2023] FedFamC2G 993, has again demonstrated the limitations of copyright protection in the world of creative content ideas generation. ‘Buster, the Brave Little Wooden Boat’ In 2009, Ms Duncan submitted a script proposal for a children’s animated show titled ‘Buster the Brave Little Wooden Boat’ to the ABC. Set in an ..read more

** Drew Engel, a Summer Associate in NRF’s Minneapolis office, assisted with this article. Drew is supervised by attorneys who are licensed in the state of Texas.** The Tenth Circuit’s recent decision in Hetronic Int’l Inc. v. Hetronic Germany GmbH is the latest in the Abitron v. Hetronic trademark conflict. Abitron was a licensed distributor of Hetronic’s radio remote controls for heavy duty construction equipment. However, after the distribution agreement ended, Abitron reverse engineered Hectronic’s products and used Hetronic’s marks on the products it sold outside of the United States, bel ..read more