Nick Liu

Dr. Liu is a highly experienced and respected lawyer who concentrates his practice on the full spectrum of intellectual property, antitrust and competition, litigation and arbitration.

Prior to joining AnJie Law Firm, Dr. Liu served as a prestigious intellectual property senior judge in the Beijing High People’s Court. He tried more than 2,000 IP cases, many of which had profound impacts on the IP industry practice. Dr. Liu especially specializes in cases regarding SEPs (standard essential patents), pharmaceutical patents, trademarks and trade secrets since he had well-rounded and extensive experience in such litigations during his time on the bench.

As a partner of AnJie Law Firm, Dr. Liu has handled numerous high-profile patent and other IP litigation, such as Sharp v. OPPO (a very famous SEP case in China, which was rated as one of the top 10 IP cases in Chinese courts in the year of 2020), AstraZeneca v. Patent Re-examination Board (a milestone case for chemical compound-related inventions, which was rated as one of the 50 typical IP cases in Chinese courts in the year of 2018) and Qualcomm v. Apple, etc.

Dr. Liu has a deep understanding of trial method in Chinese courts and helps client fight the case from the trial perspective as a former judge. Dr. Liu focuses on the key issues during the hearings, states the key facts and legal opinions effectively and always leads the case in favor of clients.

Dr. Liu published three IP related academic monographs, Guideline for Patent Infringement Litigation in China, Application of the Law on Invention/Utility Model Administrative Lawsuits – Rules and Cases and Liability of Internet Service Providers on Indirect Intellectual Property Infringement. These books received wide acclaim among lawyers in China and were regarded as guidelines for resolving various IP-related issues. Also, Dr. Liu published many influential IP-related articles and essays in some well-known journals and magazines.

Dr. Liu is often invited as a guest of honor by many major Intellectual Property conferences and convention, where he delivered some keynote speeches such as patent administrative litigation practices and issues, the rules for determining patent infringement and interpreting patent claims, the rules for determining trademark infringement, etc.

Representative Cases

(1) Patent Related Representative Matters

• Represented Sharp in a very famous SEP case against OPPO before the Shenzhen Intermediate Court concerning the global FRAND terms on Sharp’s SEP patents on LTE technology.

• Represented AstraZeneca for administrative litigation, a series of cases concerning invalidation of invention patent “Ticagrelor” “Ticagrelor polymorph” and “Ticagrelor intermediates and preparation methods”; in the “Ticagrelor” case, he led his IP team successfully persuaded the court of second instance to reverse the first-instance decision (AstraZeneca v. Patent Re-examination Board case). This is a milestone case in recent years for chemical compound related inventions, and was rated as one of the 50 Typical Intellectual Property Cases In The Year Of 2018.

• Represented AstraZeneca for patent litigations against several generic drug companies.

• Represented Nanjing Sanhome Pharmaceutical Co, ltd. in a patent infringement litigation before the Supreme People’s Court and won.

• Represented Nanjing Sanhome Pharmaceutical Co, ltd. in a patent invalidation administrative litigation before the Supreme People’s Court and won, the Supreme People’s Court ruled in favor of our client and reversed the decision of first instance court.

• Represented Novo Nordisk for administrative litigation, a case concerning invalidation of invention patent “lilalutide preparation”.

• Represented Qualcomm for major invention patent litigations against Apple before Jiangsu High People’s Court.

• Representing Renshesand Beijing Renchuang Technology Group Co., Ltd. in a patent infringement litigation before the Supreme People’s Court and won.

(2) Trade Secret Related Representative Matters

• Represented a large oil company, this case was valued over 100 million RMB, which would have a great influence in the industry.

• Represented a large tech company, this case was valued over RMB 100 million, which would have a great influence in the industry.

• Helped a tech company to build trade secret protection system.

(3) Trademark Related Representative Matters

• Lead the IP team represented Tencent in a trademark infringement and unfair competition litigation against a e-commerce company and the court awarded 50 million RMB compensation for our client.

• Lead the IP team represented Tencent in a trademark infringement and unfair competition litigation against a tech company. The court awarded 50 million RMB compensation for our client and recognized the unregistered trademark “weishi” as well-known trademark.

• Represented a financial equipment company in a unfair competition litigation and won.

• Lead the IP team represented Beijing Huanqiu Meiyu advertisement Co., Ltd. in a trademark administrative litigation regarding “three years non-use revocation” before Beijing High People’s court and won.

• Lead the IP team represented Greenworks (JIANGSU) Co., Ltd in a trademark administrative litigation regarding “invalidation of registration of mark” in the second instance court and won.

• Participated in the trial of administrative dispute case of “qingyang” trademark, creatively came up with the view that Article 44 of Trademark Law can be referentially applicable in trademark application review, authorization and related litigation process. This case was selected as one of the ten typical intellectual property cases of Beijing courts and was selected as No.24 reference case by the Beijing High People’s Court.

• Participated in the trial of Reexamination dispute case of the objection of trademark of “Perrier-Jouet”, this case was selected as No. 10 reference case in Beijing Courts by the Beijing High People’s Court.

(4) Copyright Related Representative Matters

• Participated in the trial of Copyright dispute case concerning whether aircraft shape and model constitutes work.

• Represented a investment company against a big tech company in China in a copyright infringement litigation.

(5) Civil Related Representative Matters

• Represented Weixing Chen against a investment company in a contractual litigation and won.

(6) Antitrust Related Representative Matters

• Represented Sharp in a antitrust investigation brought by the National Anti-Monopoly Administration..

Honors & Recognition

Legal 500: Practice Head, 2020-2021

Asialaw Profiles: Notable practitioner, 2023

IAM Patent 1000: The World’ s Leading Patent Professionals, 2020-2022

IAM Strategy 300: The World’s Leading IP Strategists, 2021-2022

WTR 1000：The World’ s Leading trademark Professionals, 2022

Asia IP: Top 100 IP Experts in China, 2020-2021

Expert member of the amendment panel for the 14th edition of the ICC Intellectual Property Roadmap

Publications

• Guideline for Patent Infringement Litigation in China (China Legal Publishing House, April 2019)

• Application of the Law on Invention/Utility Model Administrative Lawsuits – Rules and Cases • (Intellectual Property Publishing House, September 2017)

• Liability of Internet Service Providers on Indirect Intellectual Property Infringement (Intellectual Property Publishing House, September 2018)

• Determination of Similar Trademarks and Similar Goods: Standards, Problems and Solutions, Intellectual Property Journal, ISSUE 4 (2003), Chinese Social Sciences Citation Index (CSSCI)

• Patent Claim Construction in Patent Appeal Proceedings, Intellectual Property Journal, ISSUE 6, (2017), CSSCI

• Application of the Good Faith Principle in Trademark Appeal and Cancellation Proceedings, Social Sciences of Beijing, ISSUE 11 (2015), CSSCI

• Review of Liabilities of Illegal Use of Patented Products, Yunnan Normal University Journal, ISSUE 6 (2015), CSSCI

• The “Broadest Reasonable Interpretation” of Patent Claim: United States Experiences and Its Reference Significance, China Patents & Trademarks, ISSUE 1 (2017)

• Application of Law on Inappropriate Trademark Application Behavior during Trademark Registration Process, The People’s Judicature, ISSUE 24 (2015)

• Determination Standard of Trademark Rights – Take “Sony Ericsson” and “Viagra” Trademark Disputes as Example, Retrospect and Prospect of Trademark Trial – in Memory of 30 Years since the Issue of Trademark Law (the People’s Court Publishing House, December 2013)

• Review of China’s Well-known Trademark System – Starting from Application of Article 13 of the Trademark Law, Electronics Intellectual Property, ISSUE 4 (2014)

• The Nature, Problems and Reconstruction of China’s Patent Reexamination System, Electronics Intellectual Property, ISSUE 11 (2015)

• Patent Claim Construction under Contextualism, Electronics Intellectual Property, ISSUE 7 (2016)

• Determination of the Scope of Reexamination for Trademark Opposition – Concurrently Discuss Understanding and Application of Article 28 of the Trademark Review and Adjudication Rules, China Trademark, ISSUE 11 (2013)

• Analysis on the Working Guidelines Concerning Trial of Standard and Essential Patent Disputes by Guangdong Higher People’s Court (For Pilot Implementation), Zhichanli,2019

Working Experience

Beijing AnJie Broad Law firm, Partner, Attorney at law

Beijing High People’s Court, Senior Judge

The General Hospital of the PLA, Legal Counsel

Qualifications