From this point of view, if a foreign patent is not applied in China, it is better that the patent is not protected by law in China, and domestic enterprises can copy the patented technology or product for free without fear of infringement.
Further, can domestic enterprises apply for and obtain authorization?
Domestic enterprises can apply for the patent, because there is no principle of prohibiting application in the patent law.
However, domestic enterprises may not be authorized. Strictly speaking, domestic units should not be authorized.
Because China's patent law stipulates that inventions protected by patents should be "novel, creative and practical", among which "novelty" means that the same inventions and creations have not been recorded in public publications before the patent application date, and are not known to the public in other ways, and there is no conflicting application. Simply put, this situation of the landlord belongs to the loss of novelty caused by "recording in public publications". Therefore, when a domestic enterprise submits a patent application to the Chinese Patent Office, if the application has been substantially examined and there are no omissions, it should be rejected on the grounds of loss of novelty. However, in practice, it is possible to be granted a patent right because only the invention patent is examined in substance and the utility model design patent is not retrieved. However, this right is unstable, and any public can declare the patent invalid through the post-authorization procedure. An invalid patent right shall be regarded as nonexistent from the beginning.
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