When China fined U.S. chipmaker Qualcomm Inc. a record $975 million last February for what it said were exorbitant patent-licensing fees, Chinese regulators signaled that there was a new target in their growing enforcement of the country’s antimonopoly law: intellectual property.
“This is a trend,” says Wu Peng, managing partner at China’s Zhong Lun Law Firm, who led a 20-lawyer team acting as Qualcomm’s main counsel throughout the investigation. “There will be more and more antitrust cases involving intellectual property.”
