The Beijing Intellectual Property Tribunal heard its first case in last December, since it was set up at the beginning of November to improve the quality of trials and fulfil judicial reform. In the first case, a pharmaceutical company, Wecome Pharmaceutical Corp, in Lishui, Zhejiang province, sued the State Intellectual Property Office, claiming a patent issued by the authority was invalid. In early December, 221 intellectual property cases had been filed, of which 63 per cent were related to administrative disputes, such as patents and brand names. And about 36 per cent involved foreign litigants. Establishing intellectual property tribunals was raised by the leadership during the Third Plenum of the 18th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, and setting them up has been a contribution to furthering judicial reform. The tribunal has adopted assistants, a member of a collegiate bench, who are responsible to collect materials about a dispute and clarify its focus before a trial and to participate in hearings and discussions with judges. The gLAWcal Team LIBEAC project Thursday, 18 December 2014 (Source: China Daily)