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Sydney, March 2013: Since 2005 the Australia based and independent Climate Institute ranks countries according to their efforts in favor of sustainable climate protection. According to a recently published list, China has climbed to rank 3 in view of massive investments into environmental protection measures. Germany has dropped to rank 6. France is the leading the ranking, followed by Japan, China, South Korea and Great Brittan.
Chicago, March 2013: The court has terminated a patent lawsuit ISE (International Securities Exchange) had initiated versus CBOE (Chicago Board Options Exchange). ISE being an affiliate of Deutsch Boerse AG has alleged that CBOE had copied their electronic option trading system. Another lawsuit by CBOE versus ISE with damages claimed in the amount of more than 500 million U.S.$ (see our previous report) is still pending.
Munich, March 2013: For the first time Samsung and, thus, a non-European innovator filed the largest number of European patent applications. With almost 2,300 applications in 2012 Samsung took over Siemens which filed almost 2,200 patent applications. BASF is on the third rank.
The increasing filing activities by non-European applicants such as Samsung is another indicator for the further progress of globalization.
Oxford, January 2013: For 2030 Oxford Economics estimates China’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to amount to 65.4 trillion US$. Thus, China’s GDP will almost reach the combined GDPs of the US and the EU amounting 71.9 Billion US$ by then. At present, China’s GDP of 8.2 trillion $ adds up to less than a quarter of the combined national economies of the US and the EU amounting in total to 34.4 trillion $.
Berlin, January 2013: According to a survey by the ZEW-Institute in Mannheim on behalf of the German Ministry of Education and Research the expenses on innovations in Germany have increased from 2011 to 2012 by 9.2% to 132 Billion Euros in total. In 2013 this amount will probably further increase to 140 Billion Euros. This increase primarily centers on economically successful large companies in the fields of automotive, electronic, mechanical engineering and energy supplying industries. At the same time, the absolute number of innovating companies has decreased by 3% to 39,5% in total. This is below the already low levels of the economically weak years 2009 and 2010. This indicates a further rather negative polarization in the German innovative capacities.
China, January 2013: Kaercher, a German company specialized on cleaning technology, fully succeeds in China in a lawsuit versus the China based company Wenzhou Haibao. Kaercher is now able to stop copying products of a high-pressure cleaners. This case is an example of the increasing legal certainty in China regarding IP. Also Chinese companies investing in R&D suffer more and more by copies from Chinese competitors. Thus, in more than 90% of all IP suits in China only domestic companies are involved.
Munich, January 2013: Nike files 75% of all European patent applications of the top 5 sporting goods producers. This means 650 applications in 10 years, 300 of them being directed to shoes only. Adidas has a share of 15%, Puma 5%, Asics 2% and Reebok only 1%, according to a survey by the Munich based firm Gruenecker. Nike thus dominates their competitors in Europe also in terms of innovative capacity.
Pittsburgh, USA, December 2012: The Californian chip-manufacturer MARVELL has to pay 1.17 billion dollars damages to the Carnegie-Mellon-University. The suit has been based on two patents and could be tripled in case of willful infringement. The two patents from the years 2001 and 2002 are directed to the noise filtering during the reading of hard disc drives. These damages are very essential for MARVELL generating an annual turnover of less than 4 billion dollars.
The Chicago Board Options Exchange (cBoE) has sued International Securities Exchange (IsE) in Chicago and has alleged infringement of three patents being directed to the risk monitoring of pricing. IsE is an affiliate of the Deutsche Boerse AG (German Stock Exchange) and is now confronted with damage claims of at least 525 Millionen US$.
December 2012: In 2012 Chinas exports have unexpectedly increased by 14.1% and
imports by 6% compared to the year before.
