Recently, the Berkeley Center for Law&Technology (BCLT) at the University of California Berkeley Law School, hosted an online intellectual property roundtable event on the “Draft Amendment to the Trademark Law of the People Republic of China”, the event was moderated by Mr. Mark A. Cohen, a Senior Fellow at BCLT's Asia IP Project, former counsel at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and Intellectual Property Attaché at the U.S. Embassy in China. Mr. Charles Feng, Senior Partner and Attorney at Law, Director of International Business Department at Tahota, Beijing was invited to attend and gave a special speech on the latest modifications of this Draft Amendment and his proposals.

Mr. Charles Feng made a special lecture on the topic of bad faith application and prohibited repeated application, and focused on explaining the latest revised provisions. In the bad faith application part, Mr. Charles Feng pointed out that the Draft Amendment had clarified the circumstances of bad faith applications. On this basis, Mr. Charles Feng extended the discussion on the background and reasons for the amendment of invalidation on relative grounds stipulated in the Draft Amendment, analyzed and commented on the background of domestic and international legislation and practice on compulsory transfer of trademarks. Mr. Charles Feng also commented on the administrative penalties and judicial compensation system for bad faith trademark applications in the said Draft Amendment. In the part of prohibited repeated application, Mr. Charles Feng gave an in-depth explanation on the prohibition of repeated applications and the exceptions. Lawyers from China and the United States expressed their views on the relevant contents and had a lively discussion.

 After the event, the participants actively interacted and exchanged views with Mr. Charles Feng, who answered and solved the questions raised by the participants one by one. The roundtable discussion was highly praised by all the participants.