Tellectual property rights are highly valued in the US. The protection system of intellectual property rights in the US is also very perfect. If a company exporting products to the US wants to fight a patent or trademark infringement lawsuit, the cost will be up to 160-300 US dollars. If the product patent or trademark is confirmed to be infringed, the export company will directly face the risk of losing the American market.

Therefore, if cross-border e-commerce enterprises want to plough the American market deeply, it is necessary to deepen the knowledge of overseas legal risk knowledge and reduce the legal risk of operation.

"The 337 investigation of terror"

337 investigation, refers to the United States International Trade Commission (United States International Trade Commission, referred to as USITC) according to the "1930 year tax law" section 337th (referred to as the "337 provisions") investigation and relevant amendments, to prohibit all acts of unfair competition or exports to the United States in any unfair trade practices. These acts include:

1, the product enters the United States in the way of unfair competition or unfair behavior.

2, the owner, importer and agent of the product sell the product on the US market in an unfair way, and cause substantial damage or threat to the related industries in the US.

3, hindering the establishment of related industries in the United States, or suppressing and manipulating American business and trade;

4. Infringe the legitimate and effective American trademark and patent, or infringe the exclusive rights of the integrated circuit chip design.

5, it violates the other design rights protected by the United States, and the relevant industries or related industries in the United States are in the process of building up.

The products that have been found to be infringed by the 337 survey need to withdraw unconditionally from the US market. In practice, the 337 investigations involving intellectual property rights in the United States are mainly for infringement of patents or trademarks. A few surveys also involve copyright, industrial design and infringement of integrated circuit layout design. Unfair competition includes other forms such as leaking business secrets, counterfeiting, false advertising, and anti - monopoly law.

The 337 investigation includes the application, filing, responding, meeting, before hearing evidence, hearing and Administrative Committee for reconsideration and judge preliminary determination, final determination, the president to consider a series of procedures. When any party is not satisfied with the result of the USITC's decision, it may appeal to the Federal Circuit of appeals of the United States.

According to the provisions of the United States "1930 year tax law" in the 337th quarter, the U.S. International Trade Commission should complete a survey in 337 "as soon as possible and feasible time and make the corresponding decision. In the specific practice, the US International Trade Commission usually needs 12-15 months to end the investigation, and some complex cases can be extended to 18 months, which is much more efficient than the court proceedings.

337 the terms of trade protection means the most adaptable and lethal international, who is the 337 survey found violations of existing foreign export products, will be issued the ban on imports means directly banned the import of products involved in the United States and market sales, and this ban can not avoid.

    Cross-border exports need to prevent trouble before it happens

The 337 clause has long crossed the border, and the infringement in the world may be prosecuted, and may even involve non export. According to the requirement of 337 investigation of the general exclusion order, if an enterprise loses a lawsuit in a tort case, the other enterprises producing the product will also have to withdraw from the US market unconditionally. Therefore, the cross-border export enterprises should prevent and avoid being the defendant of the 337 investigation.

337 the purpose of the survey was to limit unfair behavior in the import trade of the United States. Many enterprises have become the defendants of the 337 investigation because they do not know or lack the awareness of intellectual property protection. In the course of foreign trade, some preventive measures can be taken to reduce the risk of the US exporters to be the defendants of the 337 investigation.

1. When exporting products to the United States, first investigate whether the same or similar technology, design and trademark are applicable to the same products in the United States.

2. When an importer is entrusted with an order to produce an export product to the United States, an exemption clause on the infringement of intellectual property rights is added to the contract of entrusting processing.

3, before the production or export, entrusting the relevant intermediary organizations to carry out retrieval to reduce the possibility of infringement;

4. The entrustment lawyer's export product does not constitute the legal opinion of the infringement of intellectual property rights.

In exports to the United States before, we first need to improve awareness of intellectual property protection, check erroneous ideas at the outset. Chinese enterprises must be prepared in advance. First, patent search is conducted to see if it is possible to infringe on the US patent that relates to the product, or the US patent for the manufacturing method and technology of the product, and even invite experts to analyze the patent protection status of the product in the US. Compared with the loss of the loss, the cost of patent retrieval is negligible.

If there is a possible violation of the patent rights of the United States company, the product should be adjusted in time so as to avoid infringement of intellectual property rights. If there is another possibility of infringement, other methods need to be used to bypass patents to avoid infringement. If some core technology patents can not be circumvented, they can also obtain patent licensing materials from the patentor, or negotiate with importers, and bear the liability for infringement.

It is understood that, at present, if we want to fight a patent infringement lawsuit in the United States, the starting price will be 500 thousand dollars, and after that, the total amount will be up to 200-300 US dollars. The 337 survey is not cheap, but it is much cheaper than court lawsuits, with a cost of about $1 million 600 thousand.

Besides, for cross-border export enterprises, if we want to put an end to potential infringement risks at the beginning, we should make market investigation and risk prevention before entering the US market, and do early-warning and Research on trademarks and patents. Trademark is best for trademark retrieval. Registered trademarks in China also need to be registered in the US, because trademarks and patents are regionality, if registered in China, there will be risks of infringement if they are not applied in the US.

If the 337 investigation has been launched in the United States because of trademark infringement, it is suggested that the export enterprises should take measures to respond actively and actively, and can not be avoided passively. It is better to find experienced lawyers in the United States, because they are relatively familiar with the legal environment of the United States, and avoid malicious infringement in the law. (the defendant's trademark infringement is also a sale action), the US court will make 3 times punitive damages for it.

Therefore, if the cross-border e-commerce enterprises want to deep plough the American market, before export, the intellectual property right this step must be paid attention to.