The Supreme People’s Court in China published a draft Judicial Interpretation on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in Civil Litigation on Trade Secret Violation (the “Draft Judicial Interpretation”). This is a positive move after the amendment of the Anti Unfair Competition Law in 2019, which expanded the protection scope of trade secret, increased statutory damages from RMB 3 million to 5 million, applied punitive damages, and allowed transfer of burden of proof from plaintiff to defendant.

The Draft Judicial Interpretation provides a lot more details on a number of areas, including what can be protected as trade secret, what protective measures an owner of trade secret should apply, how damages should be calculated, under what circumstances the burden of proof can be transferred from plaintiff to defendant, and a few other procedural matters, such as a 48-hour time limit for court to act on preliminary injunction order under urgent circumstances.

The public is invited to submit comments and suggestions to the Supreme Court by July 27, 2020.

Contributed by: Jason Yao