In recent days, the state intellectual property administration has published a white paper on the protection of intellectual property rights in china (hereinafter referred to as the white paper) for the year 2002. The white paper presents a comprehensive picture of the progress made in the protection of intellectual property rights in our country in 2025 and provides a systematic picture of the solid results of institution-building, registration, cultural development and international cooperation。
According to the white paper, 2025 is the year of admission of china's “145” planning officers. The tasks of the national plan for the protection and application of intellectual property rights in the 14th five-year plan are well under way, with a number of indicators being completed ahead of schedule and the overall results being in line with expectations。
Since 1998, annual white papers on the state of intellectual property protection have been issued. The white paper has become an important way for all national and international communities to learn about the latest developments in the protection of intellectual property rights in our country。
Protection effectiveness is significantly enhanced
The white paper shows that the level of judicial protection, administrative protection, concerted protection and source protection of intellectual property rights in our country has continued to increase since the fourteenth session. Social satisfaction in intellectual property protection has steadily risen to over 82 points, providing an important incentive for business owners to have steady expectations, strong confidence and dynamism, and providing a solid basis for better promotion of high-standard market systems and enabling quality development. The number of patents on high-value inventions per 10,000 of our population has reached 16, and the development of intellectual property rights has reached a new stage。
Judicial protection is fully strengthened. In 2025, china's judiciary at all levels fully implemented strict protection of intellectual property rights. It placed greater emphasis on the rule of law, in coordination with reform, development and stability, effectively performing its important function of punishing crime, protecting people and maintaining justice, and helping to accelerate development with quality justice. The civil trials of intellectual property rights have been strengthened and 473,000 new cases of civil first instance of intellectual property rights have been brought before national courts. Criminal inspection of intellectual property is carried out in accordance with the law, and the prosecution service receives 6220 cases of arrests for offences against intellectual property. The national public security organs have promoted special efforts and actions such as the “quinlón” “amcre” “combating pseudo-demeanour crimes in the consumer sphere”, and have vigorously combated crimes against intellectual property rights and the sale of counterfeit goods。
Administrative protection is advanced. In 2025, china's executive branch at all levels continued to improve its working mechanisms for “horizontal connectivity, vertical synergy and intensive efficiency”, further enhancing its capacity and level of administrative protection of intellectual property rights. A total of 37,000 cases of intellectual property violations have been investigated by market regulators at all levels throughout the country, amounting to 677 million yuan. There were 9520 administrative decisions on patent tort disputes filed by intellectual property authorities at all levels throughout the country, resulting in 9,341 cases. A total of 39,000 shipments of goods suspected of import or export abuse were seized by the national customs service, and 8. 64 million were seized。
The protection system is improving rapidly. In 2025, the construction of the intellectual property protection system was carried out in depth, the policy standards for “strictly protected” continued to be sound, the institutional mechanisms for “greatly protected” continued to improve, the interface between “quick protection” continued to strengthen, and the determination and effectiveness of “to protect” continued to be demonstrated. Seven new national intellectual property protection centres and fast-track defence centres have been established, bringing the total to 129, and the overseas intellectual property dispute management guidance platform has recovered $2. 75 billion of business losses throughout the year。
Strong strengthening of rule of law guarantees
In 2025, our country insisted on a high level of rule of law to support high-quality development of intellectual property rights, strengthened the rule of law guarantees of intellectual property rights, promoted the development of laws, regulations, sectoral regulations and related judicial interpretations, issued some 20 normative and policy documents relating to intellectual property protection, and steadily advanced the revision of local legal systems for intellectual property protection。
The national intellectual property agency strengthens the intellectual property system through sectoral regulations. The patent review guide, which came into effect on 1 january 2026, further improves the intellectual property protection system for new business practices in new areas, such as artificial intelligence, stream media and new varieties of plants. Actively promote the establishment of the commercial secrets protection regulations, improve the criteria for determining business secrets, refine the rules for identifying violations of business secrets and strengthen the administrative protection of business secrets。
Judicial interpretation makes the system more solid. The supreme people's court's supreme people's procuratorate's interpretation of certain issues of the law applicable to criminal cases of violation of intellectual property rights has been in force since 26 april 2025, further clarifying the criteria for sentencing intellectual property offences and regulating the handling of criminal cases. The reaction of the supreme people's court on the application of law in cases involving the evaluation of patents, which came into effect on 1 august 2025, makes it clear that the people's court cannot simply dismiss the plaintiff's complaint on the basis of a decision made by the supreme people's court on the grounds that the patent in question does not meet the conditions for the granting of patent rights set out in the law on patents, and shall interpret it in the light of the specific circumstances of the case and decide in accordance with the law。
International cooperation has gone a long way
In 2025, our country advanced cooperation in the international exchange of intellectual property rights, upholding the principles of openness, inclusion and balanced and inclusiveness, and strengthened practical cooperation with relevant international organizations and national and regional intellectual property institutions to promote a more just and rational development of the global intellectual property governance system。
The white paper shows our deep engagement in global intellectual property governance. Hosted the 18th meeting of the directors of cooperation in the five bureaus of intellectual property in central america and europe (ip5) and facilitated the extension of the five pph pilot projects until january 2029. Hosted the sixteenth china-asean meeting of directors-general of intellectual property rights. Participation in the 40th anniversary of cooperation between the central european bureaux and the 19th meeting of directors of the central european bureaux, and extension of the pilot project of the international retrieval units of the patent cooperation treaties to 2031. Participated in the second china-central asia intellectual property authority (cipr) bureau director conference, which adopted the joint statement of the second china-central asia intellectual property bureau director conference。
Cooperation with the world intellectual property organization continues to deepen. The white paper shows that we have advanced negotiations within the framework of the world intellectual property organization (wipo) and the process of negotiating treaties to protect broadcasting organizations and to protect traditional cultural expressions. :: actively promote multilateral and bilateral copyright negotiations related to economic and trade。
At the same time, judicial cooperation and joint law enforcement involving foreign countries are promoted pragmatically. The white paper shows that our country, in cooperation with the world intellectual property organization (wipo), has completed the world intellectual property organization (wipo) book of typical cases of intellectual property rights of the people's republic of china (2019-2023). Advance the updating of the world intellectual property organization (wipo) database and promote 66 typical cases to the wipo lex database. Actively recommend typical cases of business secrets to wipo. By the end of 2025, the higher people's court, which had directed shanghai, fujian, hainan, guangdong, chongqing and sichuan provinces (the municipality directly under the central government), had signed an exchange and cooperation agreement with the shanghai centre for arbitration and mediation of the world intellectual property organization (wipo) and had conducted an exchange of claims. A total of 216 cases of intellectual property involving foreign countries were referred to wipo for mediation。
The work of the central european intellectual property project (ipkey) has been continuously advanced, and a collection of intellectual property cases has been prepared jointly with the european community, increasing the international impact of intellectual property justice in china。
In addition, in accordance with the bilateral inter-state law enforcement cooperation mechanism of todo, multi-faceted law enforcement cooperation, such as co-inspection of evidence with law enforcement agencies abroad, is organized around four priority transnational cases, and transnational (border) intellectual property offences are dealt with by law. Participated in the world customs organization's fourth international joint enforcement operation “stop” to work with multinational customs to combat cross-border fraud。
