Chapter 934 You are quite a nice person!

Now that the countermeasures have been determined, the next major task will fall to the Legal Department and the Publicity Department.

For this incident, the act of filing a lawsuit itself is more important than the outcome of the lawsuit.

Therefore, Chang Haonan did not set "winning the lawsuit" as his core goal from the very beginning.

Instead, we should try our best to work towards expanding our influence.

In this way, no matter what the result is, the whole world, or at least the peers around the world, will know that this BOG reliquefaction system was haphazardly grafted on by the Koreans without the core technology.

Even if something happens, it has nothing to do with our Torch Group.

Stay away, don't let your blood fall on me.jpg

Guided by this line of thinking, pre-litigation preparations become less important.

The right thing to do is to file the lawsuit as soon as possible.

Therefore, compared with conventional intellectual property cases that often take months or even years to collect evidence, this time the Ministry of Justice acted incredibly fast.

In less than a week, Torch Group was ready to file an intellectual property lawsuit against Samsung Offshore & Marine, demanding that it stop using the BOG reliquefaction system patent registered by the former on the eight LNG ships currently being and to be built.

In fact, this efficiency is partly thanks to the Norwegian party that ordered the ship.

They specifically required in the contract that Party B should publicly display the ship's design and construction information.

The original intention of doing this is probably to facilitate subsequent operations.

But objectively, it did allow Torch Group to obtain first-hand evidence without any effort...

At the same time, publicity efforts have also continued to increase.

For several days, different Chinese media outlets reported on the Torch Group's lawsuit against Samsung Offshore from different angles.

Although the Torch Group is not well-known, it is now a subsidiary of a central enterprise directly under the Aviation Power Corporation of China and has no shortage of resources in this area.

However, the development of the situation soon exceeded Chang Haonan's expectations.

At first, he actually just contacted a few print media, intending to publish a few reports or commentary articles in secondary positions other than the front page.

But by chance, one of the reports was noticed by the leader of the trade department.

The time point in 2001 was actually very delicate.

In the past, when China did business with foreign companies, the various steps involved were quite cumbersome.

In many cases, those who actually face foreign companies are not necessarily businessmen, but officials from the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation.

Although this is a bit inefficient, the situation is basically under control.

But nowadays, the authority at the enterprise level has been greatly enhanced. Although foreign trade still requires licenses and approvals, in most cases, it is directly between domestic and foreign companies.

It is not difficult to imagine that the number of disputes arising from this in the past year is several orders of magnitude greater than in the past.

However, China has only joined the WTO for one year.

The vast majority of companies have no experience in handling such disputes and can only passively take the blame.

You don't even know where you're at a disadvantage.

Faced with this situation, the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation is at a loss.

On the one hand, due to relevant WTO regulations, it is not convenient for them to directly intervene in corporate-level affairs.

On the other hand, faced with such a huge number of problems, there would not be enough manpower to handle them one by one.

Therefore, the country now urgently needs a model to serve as an example for other companies.

See? Next time you encounter problems, just follow this.

Therefore, under the impetus of various forces, before the Torch Group's indictment was officially submitted, related reports had already appeared on the News Broadcast.

Although it was only mentioned in the news section.

There isn't even a picture.

But that was a sentence from the news broadcast after all.

Therefore, it quickly aroused greater response and attention.

For the general public, the impact of market opening is at its peak, and the filter brought by foreign companies and brands is extremely strong.

Against this backdrop, "Chinese companies suing foreign companies for intellectual property infringement" is enough to attract attention in itself.

As for the majority of business peers who are in a state of confusion, they do need a benchmark to learn from and refer to.

In short, it was not until Song Jingming sent an interview invitation from CCTV to Chang Haonan's desk that he realized belatedly that -

I, or Torch Group's historic lawsuit, has quietly become the biggest topic in China's business community in the past two days...

In fact, being on the news is nothing new to him.

After receiving the May Fourth Youth Medal and after the historic flood relief efforts, he was interviewed by CCTV.

But strictly speaking, those two times can only be regarded as part of a series of reports.

The interview materials are also edited and spliced ​​together with other footage to form comprehensive news.

But this time, it was a serious one-on-one interview.

The kind that can be served as a dish on its own.

Of course, you still have to do some superficial work.

If we were to talk about the topic of Torch Group v. Samsung Offshore & Marine from beginning to end, it would appear to be too aggressive.

Therefore, the apparent theme of the news is still about the development process of Torch Group from nothing to something, from weak to strong.

The part related to the case will probably only take up about three-quarters of the content.

Also because of the nature of the program, this interview was not conducted at Chang Haonan’s office as in the past.

But it was in a studio of CCTV.

……

When Chang Haonan arrived at the interview location at the agreed time, he was greeted not only by the head of the news center but also by another even more important figure.

"Comrade Haonan, thank you very much for supporting our work."

The visitor shook hands enthusiastically with Chang Haonan who had just got off the car.

"Director Long, you're too polite..."

After a brief shock, Chang Haonan quickly responded:

"Whether it's your work or our work, in the final analysis, the purpose is the same..."

Long Yongtu is the chief representative of the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation in charge of China's accession to the WTO and a member of the leadership team.

Chang Haonan had met the other party several times.

Of course, even if not, this name that will appear in textbooks in the future will be well-known enough.

At this moment, since China's accession process to the WTO has officially ended, Long Yongtu had to take on an idle job temporarily.

But anyone with a little foresight can guess that he will at least be the second-in-command of the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation in the future.

After a brief greeting, the three of them walked into the CCTV headquarters building under the guidance of staff.

"Tell the truth, Director Long."

While waiting for the interview to begin in the lounge, Chang Haonan said to Long Yongtu:

"You guys gave me a big surprise."

"Before receiving this interview invitation today, I didn't know that your Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation had already paid attention to this matter."

Originally, this sentence was just a small talk to kill time, but Long Yongtu sighed seriously:

"Ugh……"

"After joining the WTO, we discovered that in international trade, disputes far outweigh cooperation."

"You may not believe it, but over the past year or so, your Torch Group was the first company in mainland China to take the initiative to go through legal procedures to resolve trade disputes."

"So no matter what the result is, we have to hold this example up..."

Chang Haonan actually knew about this.

In the previous life, it was not until 2006 that the first Chinese company sued a foreign company for intellectual property infringement.

This shows how backward China's awareness is in this regard.

On the other side, after a brief pause, Long Yongtu continued:

"Originally, the ministry was ready to promote the case according to the standard of 'the first case after joining the WTO'. But you emphasized yesterday that the purpose of this lawsuit was not to win and there was a high probability that there would be no clear result in the end. That's why we held an emergency meeting and temporarily decided to lower the tone a little bit..."

After hearing this, Chang Haonan exclaimed in his heart, what a great guy.

He was a little confused just now, wondering why the standard of today's interview was so high that the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation even sent a member of the leadership team to accompany him...

Long Yongtu originally wanted to say something else, but at this time, the head of the news center pushed the door open and said that the interview was ready and could begin.

……

Although it is a face-to-face interview of special specifications, the format is not much different from the past.

It's just that the host has changed.

In the opening part, Chang Haonan first briefly reviewed the Torch Group’s brief but glorious development history, and then, under the guidance of the host, introduced the group’s current two main businesses.

That is, TORCH Multiphysics software and numerical computing business that can provide finished products solutions.

The second part immediately begins to introduce the topic of today's interview.

"I noticed that Huoju Group's lawsuit claims that Samsung Offshore Group has infringed your patent on BOG reliquefaction system. Could you please give us a brief introduction to this technology?"

“You just mentioned LNG ships. What is the current development status of LNG ships in China and abroad?”

"In other words, your company's patented technology will have a decisive influence on the development direction of liquefied natural gas transportation, right?"

"..."

As an interview for the public, the host certainly cannot just ask questions he or she wants to know. Instead, he or she has to lay the groundwork first and ask some basic questions for the audience in front of the TV.

After having some understanding of the background knowledge, it is convenient to enter the core topic:

"Before today's interview, I specifically reviewed the litigation documents submitted by your company to the domestic and EU courts. I wonder what your expectations are for the upcoming lawsuit? Do you want to win the case completely and make the other party stop infringing, or are you ready to settle out of court and collect patent royalties?"

It can be seen that the host has definitely done his homework.

In his opinion, Chang Haonan had made it clear yesterday that the purpose of this lawsuit was not to win, so the latter answer must be one.

Therefore, as long as Chang Haonan gave an answer, he could express his appreciation, and then naturally throw out a series of topics that he had prepared long ago.

However, faced with this question, Chang Haonan hesitated:

"Uh...actually, neither of them."

"..."

There was a hint of confusion in the eyes of the host opposite.

Chang Haonan's completely unconventional answer made him feel that his career seemed to be challenged.

However, before he could come up with the next question, Chang Haonan spoke again:

"Our original intention in filing this lawsuit was to save the LNG shipping industry."

This time, not only the host, but even Long Yongtu who had been sitting outside the camera was shocked, and he immediately made a tactical retreat.

“Save…LNG shipping?”

The host was still trying to get the topic back on track.

"Yes."

Chang Haonan nodded:

“Samsung Offshore & Marine not only illegally used our intellectual property rights for the BOG reliquefaction system, but also failed to fully understand the content of our patents.”

"If the ship is built according to their plan, the sealing of the cargo tank and the strength of the hull may be affected. Once filled with liquefied natural gas, it will become a bomb floating on the sea, which may cause gas leakage, hull cracking... or even direct explosion at any time."

"The reason why we chose to take legal action in such a high-profile manner is that economic considerations are only a secondary factor. The key is that we hope that Samsung Marine can learn a lesson from this and avoid causing immeasurable threats to international shipping safety, energy security and the global environment..."

"So, from this perspective, Samsung Offshore should actually thank us for this lawsuit, which gave them a chance to pull back from the brink and turn back."

"..."

This high-sounding speech shocked everyone in the studio.

The host who was facing Chang Haonan couldn't help but take a deep breath.

If the camera wasn't on, he would have spoken out what was in his heart at that moment -

"Mr. Chang, you are such a nice person..."