What is patent infringement?

Patent infringement: refers to the act of exploiting a patent without the permission of the patentee. Patent infringement can be divided into: 1) counterfeiting others' patents; 2) There are two methods: passing off non-patented products as patented products and passing off non-patented methods as patented methods. Anyone who infringes the patent right shall bear the punishment of stopping the infringement, confiscating the illegal income, compensating the losses of the patentee and imposing a fine. If the circumstances are serious enough to constitute a crime, criminal responsibility shall be investigated according to law. According to Article 20 of the Provisions of the Supreme People's Court on the Applicable Law in the Trial of Patent Dispute Cases, when the people's court investigates the infringer's liability for compensation in accordance with the first paragraph of Article 57 of the Patent Law, it may, at the request of the obligee, determine the amount of compensation according to the losses suffered by the obligee or the interests gained by the infringer due to infringement. The losses suffered by the obligee due to infringement can be calculated by multiplying the total sales volume of the patented product of the patentee due to infringement by the reasonable profit income of each patented product. If it is difficult to determine the total number of sales reduced by the obligee, the product of the total number of infringing products sold in the market multiplied by the reasonable profit of each patented product can be regarded as the loss suffered by the obligee due to infringement. The benefits obtained by the infringer due to infringement can be calculated by multiplying the total number of infringing products sold in the market by the reasonable profit income of each infringing product. The benefits obtained by the infringer due to infringement are generally calculated according to the operating profit of the infringer, and can be calculated according to the sales profit for the infringer who is completely engaged in infringement. Article 21. If it is difficult to determine the loss of the infringer or the interests of the infringer, and there is a patent license fee for reference, the people's court may reasonably determine the compensation amount by referring to 1 to 3 times of the patent license fee according to the category of the patent right, the nature and circumstances of the infringer's infringement, the amount of the patent license fee, the nature, scope and time of the patent license, etc. If there is no reference to the patent license fee or the patent license fee is obviously unreasonable, the people's court may, according to factors such as the type of patent right, the nature and circumstances of the infringer's infringement, generally determine the amount of compensation from 5,000 yuan to 300,000 yuan, and the maximum amount shall not exceed 500,000 yuan.