Last year, my country exported textile machinery to 192 countries and regions, with a value of US$3.783 billion. Not only did the number of exporting countries and regions hit a new high, but the export value also once again exceeded the import value (US$3.333 billion) in the same period. This continues Maintaining my country’s trade surplus in this industry shows that my country’s textile machinery companies are paying more and more attention to overseas market trade. “Going out” has become an important step for textile machinery companies to expand their business scale and achieve strategic goals.
In today’s world of global trade integration, if Chinese textile machinery companies want to truly realize their goals in overseas target markets It is not easy to control intellectual property rights. In addition to considering a series of conventional factors such as market environment, product performance and policy guidance, companies also need to pay special attention to the importance of intellectual property protection. In fact, in recent years, Chinese companies have frequently encountered intellectual property disputes in the process of overseas export trade. These intellectual property disputes often bring a lot of resistance to relevant companies entering overseas markets, and even cause companies to suffer huge economic losses and lose market initiative. The harm cannot be underestimated.
This article will focus on Truetzschler of Germany, the leader in the textile machinery industry, and explore its successful experience in the development process from the perspective of patent analysis, with a view to providing relevant information for our country. It provides certain reference and guidance for textile machinery companies’ overseas patent application layout planning.
Important measures for intellectual property rights
After searching, it was found that as of June 2020, Tru Ziller has applied for a total of 6,521 patents worldwide, and its patents cover almost all of its products and technologies. Taking the most common carding machine as an example, Truetzschler applied for 2134 patents around this product, involving a total of 371 related technologies, including improvements to the overall structural design of the carding machine, optimization of the licker-in, cylinder and doffer, As well as the design of the automation and detection functions of the carding machine. Below, the author will conduct a detailed analysis of Truetzschler’s patent application and layout features on its carding machine products.
Patent application status
First start with Judging from the innovation trend of Truetzschler in its carding machine products (using “item” as the statistical unit, it can usually be understood that a patent is an independent technology), Truetzschler has the earliest patent application in this field. It can be traced back to 1977 (see Figure 1). During this year, Truetzschler submitted three projects named “VLIESLEITVORRICHTUNG” (pile fabric guide device), “KARDENROST” (carding machine cylindrical screen), “IMPROVEMENTS IN DEVICES” TO CLEAN A TEXTILE VELLON DEFIBRAS” patent application. At this stage, Truetzschler officially put into production its DK carding machine, with a single machine output of up to 35kg/h, thus opening the door to the epoch-making “high-yield carding machine”. Since then, Truetzschler has continued to improve and optimize existing carding machines. By the end of the 1980s, Truetzschler had applied for a total of 65 related patents, with an average annual application volume of 5. In the 1990s, Truetzschler entered a period of rapid development and rapid innovation. During these 10 years, the average annual number of patent applications related to carding machines reached 9.7, showing a doubling growth trend. Coincidentally, at the 1995 ITMA international exhibition in Milan, Italy, Truetzschler launched the DK803 high-yield carding machine for the first time. This is an improved model based on the past DK740 and DK760 models. The production capacity has been greatly increased (up to 120kg/h). The product has been favored by the market as soon as it was launched. According to statistics, between 1995 and 1999 alone, more than 5,000 DK803 carding machines have been successfully installed in spinning mills around the world. After entering the 21st century, especially between 2000 and 2008, Truetzschler continued to increase its R&D and innovation efforts in this field. The average annual number of patent applications reached 15.1, and it began to focus on “product automation”. In terms of products, Truetzschler also officially launched a new generation of TC series carding machines during this period, and applied a large number of patented new technologies to this, including an integrated cotton feed box system. , integrated induction cotton feeding system, online nep detection, etc., all of which can be glimpsed in its patent application. With the development of time, Truetzschler has accumulated a large amount of technical reserves in the field of carding machines. The pace of technology research and development has slowed down, and it has begun to focus mainly on the application and transformation of patented results.
Patent layout
Looking further, Truetzschler has laid out carding machine-related patents in 27 countries and regions around the world, mainly Germany (mainland), Italy, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the United States and China, among which Germany has laid out patents There are 313 patents, 246 patents in Italy, 228 patents in Switzerland, 225 patents in the United Kingdom, 211 patents in the United States, and 164 patents in China (see Figure 2). In addition, the company also has patent applications in Japan, India, France, Brazil and other countries and regions. , the number of patent applications has reached more than 100 (using “pieces” as the statistical unit can better see the distribution by country). Judging from the geographical layout of patents, Truetzschler has a very broad range of products around the world. market, rather than relying solely on, consider different application effects, reasonably optimize the design of the structure and quantity distribution of patents, rely on the synergy between patents, effectively break the limitations of single patent protection, eliminate the adverse effects caused by defects in patent document writing, and truly achieve Combining all aspects and coordinating the layout to achieve the “strong protection” effect of patents.
Stand high and look far into the world
Patent protection has regional characteristics. Only patents that are authorized in the target country and region can enjoy local patent rights. Judging from Truetzschler’s patent layout around the world, its early planning application time and wide geographical coverage indicate that Truetzschler paid great attention to the international layout of relevant patents in the early stages of development. However, most textile machinery companies in my country believe that overseas patent layout requires high investment and slow results. Therefore, few companies will take the initiative to carry out overseas patent planning and layout, often waiting until their products are actually exported and sold overseas. I just considered doing overseas layout, but it was too late. Therefore, the patent layout emphasizes “taking a long-term view and focusing on the world.” You must not think that you can sit back and relax after applying for a patent in your own country. Instead, you should consider which patents should be entered into which countries based on your own company’s intellectual property strategic planning in the early stages of patent application. , conduct pre-assessment and planning, and carry out international patent layout work in an organized and strategic manner.
Follow the dynamic layout of the market
In fact, the patent layout also It is not static, especially the international patent application layout, which often requires a large investment for enterprises. If they cannot conduct reasonable dynamic management and operation, and lack of effective use and transformation of patents, over time As a result, enterprises will bear huge economic burdens. A healthy patent layout should be “dynamic”. The root cause is that the market is dynamic. For example, Truetzschler’s patent layout transfer on its carding machine products follows this characteristic. From the early European and American , and later China, Japan and India, in fact, it was closely related to several market shifts in the global textile machinery industry. This shows that patent layout should follow the market: for emerging markets with favorable policy and resource conditions, companies should seize the opportunity, quickly deploy, and concentrate on layout; for declining markets, relevant patents should be reviewed and analyzed in a timely manner. Effectiveness evaluation, strategically giving up some patents to free up financial space in exchange for new benefits.
Conclusions and Suggestions
For my country’s textile machinery enterprises, moving towards The road to internationalization is not only needed for enterprise development, but also the general trend of national conditions. At present, a large number of excellent textile machinery companies have emerged in our country. These companies have advanced technology and excellent product performance. They can be said to be fully capable of international competitiveness. Nowadays, if these companies want to “go out”, they not only need to compete in terms of product performance, but also We should also pay more attention to the soft power of our own “intellectual property rights”. Looking at the brilliant achievements made by textile machinery companies such as Truetzschler in its century-old development, it is not difficult to find that intellectual property protection has played an irreplaceable role in its success. Currently, our country is in a critical period for the development of the national “Belt and Road” initiative. Countries along the “Belt and Road” are rich in material resources, but their industrial capabilities are poor. They have practical and urgent needs for high-quality textile machinery equipment. It can be said that my country’s textile machinery industry The best window period for enterprises to “go global”. Faced with such a favorable political and economic situation, my country’s textile machinery enterprises should seize the opportunity to establish overseas intellectual property protection awareness as early as possible while actively preparing for foreign trade, learn and study the successful cases of outstanding enterprises in the industry, plan in advance, and Reasonable layout and dynamic adjustment, build a complete intellectual property protection system that is suitable for its own development, form a forward-looking intellectual property strategic deployment, seize the market initiative, use small things to do big things, and win the final victory in the internationalization journey. </p
