8th Asia-Pacific IP Forum in Hong Kong

Thursday 29 September, the eight Asia-Pacific IP Forum will be held at the Kowloon Shangri-La in Hong Kong. It is a fully packed day organised by Managing Intellectual Property magazine, free for in-house counsels.

The following speakers will talk about the following subjects:

• Chew Kherk Ying, partner, Wong & Partners, Malaysia, Celeste Ang, partner, Baker & McKenzie,Wong & Leow, Singapore, Adolf Panggabean, partner, Hadiputranto, Hadinoto & Partners, Indonesia will speak about enforceability and enforcement strategies in Southeast Asia.
• Then Joe Thymian, director sales & marketing – Asia Pacific, Melbourne IT Digital Brand Services will unveil the secrets of the new gTLDs – risks and opportunities for your brand.
• Elliot Papageorgiou, partner, Rouse, He Fang, partner, Rouse and Oliver Lutze, head of IPR, Bayer (China) Limited will navigate the changing patent litigation scene in China.
• Ada Leung from the Hong Kong Intellectual Property Department and Albert Ho from Hong Kong Customs will give the key note speeches. 
• Anuradha Salhotra, managing partner, Lall Lahiri & Salhotra and Doyel Sengupta, partner, Lall Lahiri & Salhotra will initiate you into the wondrous world of criminal and civil enforcement strategies in India.
• And last but not least Benjamin Choi, partner, Mayer Brown JSM will explain how to maximise your trade mark portfolio.

More information about the event and updates you can find here.

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16 Copyright Piracy Suspects Identified During Operation Torpedo in Hong Kong

According to a press release by Karri Ho from the International Federation Against Copyright Theft – Greater China (IFACT-GC), from September 29 to October 1, IFACT-GC representing the Motion Picture Association (MPA) and the CJ Mark Committee (CJ Mark) in Hong Kong, which represents Japanese rights owners, joined forces with over 120 officers from the Hong Kong Customs Intellectual Property Investigation Bureau (IPIB) and the Special Task Force (STF) in a territory-wide anti-piracy operation against a series of distribution and retail outlets selling pirated optical discs in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

19 retail shops and a warehouse were raided. Hong Kong Customs and Excise Department estimates that the seizures of the DVDs created a revenue loss of HK$ 1,147,963 (US$ 147,175).

15 or 16 suspects (in the same press release these two numbers are used) of copyright infringement of Hollywood, Hong Kong and Japanese movies were arrested.

Read the IFACT-GC press release by Karri Ho here (pdf).

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Fake Parallel Imported Disks Caught in Hong Kong

The definition of parallel import in Wikipedia is a non-counterfeit product imported from another country without the permission of the intellectual property owner.

After a week-long investigation with the help of the Motion Picture Association, Customs raided four retail shops in Mong Kok and Causeway Bay selling fake parallel-imported disks worth 1.15 million dollar and six people were arrested, on October 15, 2007, Customs and Excise Department of the Hong Kong government reports here.

A case of counterfeit "non-counterfeit product imported from another country without the permission of the intellectual property owner" so to say.

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