The Supreme People's Court (SPC) announced on Monday that courts at all levels in China received more than 540,000 new intellectual property (IP) cases in 2023, with a similar number of adjudications handed out.

At a press conference on the ongoing IP Publicity Week campaign, SPC Vice President Tao Kaiyuan summarized the highlights of the progress made by courts at all levels on strengthening the judicial protection of IP in key fields, core technologies and emerging industries.

The judicial organs have also cracked down on malicious trademark registration, as well as trademark infringement and counterfeiting, and have devoted efforts to optimizing the protection of new types of IP rights and interests, including those involving artificial intelligence and data property rights, according to Tao.

In 2023, Chinese courts applied punitive damages in 319 IP infringement cases, with the amount of damages awarded reaching 1.16 billion yuan (about 163 million U.S. dollars).

In addition, courts have deepened the reform of the appellate mechanism for IP cases at the national level, and advanced the reform of the IP litigation system, according to the SPC.

The top 10 IP cases of 2023 and 50 typical IP cases in 2023 were also released on Monday.