China chip layout rules will require applicants to show their work is original before it can receive legal protection, while courts gain authority to impose punitive damages in serious infringement cases. Premier Li Qiang signed State Council Order No. 842 on July 23, and the revised regulations take effect on October 15, according to the Ministry of Justice and China’s intellectual-property authority.
The change is aimed at the unglamorous but valuable part of chip development that gets buried beneath product launches: the physical layout used to place components within an integrated circuit. Reuters reported that Beijing is tightening registration standards as it seeks to safeguard domestic semiconductor know-how.
What do China’s chip layout rules cover?
The regulations cover detailed physical layouts that determine how components are arranged within a chip. In the published rules, an integrated-circuit layout design is the three-dimensional configuration of chip elements and some or all of their interconnections, including a configuration prepared for manufacturing.
That is narrower than chip design as a whole. The rules do not govern every architectural decision, software tool, manufacturing process, or line of source code involved in producing a semiconductor. They govern legal protection for the registered physical layout design.
Under the revised rules, a protected layout must be the creator’s own intellectual work and must not have been a commonly recognized conventional design when it was created. A collection of conventional elements can still qualify, but only if the combination itself meets the originality test, according to the official Ministry of Justice explanation.
What changes for chip-layout registrations?
Applicants must base a filing on genuine creative activity, submit an originality declaration, and provide copies or drawings that identify the original portions of the layout. The declaration must identify original design regions, design points and their functions, or explain why the layout is original as a whole.
China’s intellectual-property authority can require corrections or a response when an application is clearly non-compliant, then reject it if the problem remains. It may also revoke an improperly granted registration, and any person can ask for such a revocation. Where a registration is revoked, the associated layout-design right is treated as having never existed.
How do the penalties change?
For infringement, compensation may be based on the rights holder’s losses or the infringer’s gains. If neither can be determined readily, it may be set with reference to a multiple of the licence fee. Courts may award punitive damages where the circumstances are serious. The published material does not specify a numerical multiplier or define what makes a case serious.
The revision also sets out clearer rules for licensing, transfers and using layout-design rights as collateral. Organizations that lead qualifying design work must give eligible creators reasonable rewards and remuneration.
Reuters said the measures are not export controls. They arrive as Chinese chip companies pursue domestic alternatives after U.S. restrictions on advanced semiconductor-design software and manufacturing equipment. Separate reports about possible restrictions on overseas production are not part of these revised layout-design regulations.
This story draws on original reporting from Tom's Hardware.
