This post explains how to protect your product from China when having your product made in China. One of the first things our international manufacturing lawyers do when working with a company having products made in China is to figure out the contracts and IP registrations that will ensure our client's intellectual property and other rights will be protected against its Chinese manufacturer and the rest of the world.
But lately our international litigation team has been seeing a vertible ton of a particularly sinster scam: The “Sha Zhu Pan” (Chinese: 杀猪盘) or, “Butchering the Pig” scam. The typical email we receive from a victim of this forex or crypto scam is usually something like this.
International Manufacturing Turmoil Increases International Manufacturing Risks With the increasing risks of manufacturing in China, our international manufacturing lawyers are being contacted by many companies seeking legal help after all has been lost. These are mostly companies that moved their manufacturing to "bad" Chinese manufacturers or to other countries in an effort to reduce their
China-Latam ties are growing. This is an important development for businesses, and not just those in China and Latin America. For businesses in the United States and most of the global north, China presents a conundrum. The lure of its vast markets remains strong, and for many companies it remains the go-to location for manufacturing or sourcing their products. At the same time, there's increasing concern at home about China's behavior. If it was "just" a matter of human rights violations, there might be less concern overall with possible spill-on effects. However, there's also a—not unjustified—feeling that China has unfairly muscled its way to economic dominance. As a result, companies must walk a fine line as they seek the benefits of China engagement, in order to placate increasingly frustrated customers at home. But things are different in the global south.
Web3 China vocabulary. Chinese companies are investing in web3 technologies despite the countrywide crypto mining ban. Here is help learning Chinese web3 vocabulary.
Biden's decision to extend solar trade wars and modify tariffs shows climate change is as important as protecting US manufacturers.
Is China too big to fail? Evergrande’s insolvency shows that state control over China's banking system does not eliminate systemic risk in the Chinese economy.
Pretty much every week, at least one of our China lawyers will -- after a five minute review -- have to tell a potential client their contract is worthless. We see all kinds of worthless contracts. NDA and NNN Agreements, Manufacturing Agreements, Licensing Agreements, Distribution Agreements, Product Development Agreements, Employment Agreements. It goes on and on. And as tempted as I am to ask why these companies would think a US law contract that calls for disputes to be resolved in Boston or Des Moines would make sense in China, I always refrain from doing so, and I have seen some doozies, including the following:
Every few months someone will write one of my law firm's China lawyers asking them to translate an already written contract for China. We always refuse, not just because we are lawyers not translators, but because doing so would be a complete waste of time because contracts that work for the United States, Europe, Australia, Canada, etc., do not work for China and putting those contracts into Chinese won't change that. Indeed, it is ridiculous to think that an American business owner could draft a contract in English and that contract would work for China.
As I noted in my previous post on China NNN agreements, for enforcement purposes you must make sure your China NNN agreement has teeth. To understand how enforcement works under Chinese law, we need to do a little work. The first point to realize is that the standard approach for enforcing an IP contract under the common law (this is the law in the United States and the UK and most of the British world) has no application under Chinese law. In the common law system, lawyers are mostly concerned with two issues. First, the rule that disfavors liquidated damage provisions. Second, the law/equity distinction that allows only for injunctive relief when a law (damages) remedy is not available.
