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[IP Compliance]Beware of Unintentional Counterfeiting of Patent: Measures for Labeling Patent Marks to be implementedMeasures for Labeling of Patent Marks (the “Measures”) were promulgated on March 8, 2012 and will come into effect on May 1, 2012. The Measures are an amendment to and substitute of Provisions on the Method to Indicate Patent Marks and Patent Numbers issued in 2003 (the “Provisions”). Based on a thorough study of the Measures and a careful comparison of the Measures and the Provisions, the IP team of HaoLiWen Partners would like to draw your attention to the points below:The Measures has amended the patent mark user from “the patentee, or the licensee of the patent exploitation license contract subject to the consent of the patentee” stipulated in the Provisions into “the patentee, or the licensee subject to the consent of the patentee”. Such revision may suggest that some other parties which are not licensees of patent exploitation contracts may be entitled to use patent marks in some special cases. Whether this is case or not still remains to be seen in future practice.In contrast with the Provisions, the Measures has enlarged the scope of use of patent mark by adding “materials such as the manuals of such products”, which conforms to the practice and need of using patent marks on manuals and advertising and promoting materials. Since the effective day, it is clear there will be no risks of being “illegal” when labeling their patent marks on materials other than products and packaging.What is more important, the Measures are purposely equipped with a provision to set out the manner to label patent marks prior to the grants of such patents ( i.e. the patent application type, the patent application number, and the specific term as of “patent in application, not granted yet” ), so as to distinguish the patented products from those yet to be patented clearly, maintain market competition in order, and avoid confusing the public. We hereby specifically p