Legal Notebook

Several engineers of Company A downloaded drawing software from the internet. A few months later, Company A received a Lawyer’s Letter from Company B, in which it stated that Company A had downloaded Company B’s software, Company B required Company A to pay the license fee amount up to RMB 1 million. The evidence of using was attached to the Lawyer’s Letter. Company A insisted that it was the employees’ personal behavior, so it refused to pay the license fee. Then Company B filed the lawsuit to the court, under the mediation of the court, finally, the two parties reached…

In order to be the leader in the market, Company A took the ‘Sales is Everything’ as its first priority. All the salesmen had done their best to make the deal, but ignore the examination of the clients’ credit and the management of the payment terms. Later on, the sale volume increased a lot, but the company had to face the serve finance burden on collecting debts. ‘Collecting debts’ is a common problem, and the reasons are varied, such as some companies may focus on the sale volume, but ignore the examination of the credit of the other party; some…

As the salesman of a Shanghai company, Liao had to travel throughout the country frequently, and apply for reimbursement with a lot invoices every month. At the end of the year, the company hired an accounting firm to conduct audit. The auditor found that some of the invoices submitted by Liao did not match the time and cities of the actual business travel. After investigation, the company found that Liao had used the invoices amount to nearly RMB30, 000 to apply for the reimbursement, and such invoices had no relationship with the business travel, which should be deemed as the…

In February 2014, Ms. Zhou asked for the marriage leave. Because Ms. Zhou got married at a late age as stipulated by the relevant law (Note: The late marriage leave would be abolished since the ‘Amendment of the Law of the People’s Republic of China on Population and Family Planning’ will come into force on 1st Jan. 2016 ), the company approved 10 days leave. Later then, Ms. Zhou got divorced. In 2015, Ms. Zhou remarried, and asked for the marriage leave again, but the company refused her application. In practice, the employers would ignore the issues related to the…

Mr. Wong was the technical department manger at Company A. One day, he downloaded Company A’s food formula and the entire process drawings into his personal computer, which had violated the company’s confidentiality provisions. After that, he resigned with the reason that he would go back to his hometown. Later, Company A was informed that Wong was working at Company B, who was the competitor of Company A. After investigation, Company A found that Company B was planning to use the new technology brought by Wong to build a new production line. Company A reported to the police quickly. But…

Company A and Company B had signed a “Sales Contract”, in which it had prescribed that Company A would purchase a set of machine from Company B. Later, the machine was delivered to Company A, but Company A refused to make the payment. After more than one year delay, Company B filed the dispute to the court, and required Company A to make the payment and undertake the late payment penalty. Company A defended that the contract had prescribed that the payment should be made upon receiving the invoice. Because Company B had not issued the invoice yet, Company A…

In order to protect the shareholder’s right to know (‘SRK’), Article 33 of the ‘Company Law ‘has stipulated that a shareholder may request to examine the articles of association, the meeting minutes of the shareholders’ meeting, the resolution of the board of directors, the resolutions of the board of supervisors, the financial reports, and accounting books. However, such documents may state the information which may be deemed as trade secrets as stipulated in the ‘Anti-Unfair Competition law’, e.g. the business plan, production management, purchase and sale information. If there is no restriction on ‘SRK’, then such right might be abused…

In the “Employee Handbook”, Company A has stipulated while an employee asks for an emergency sick leave, the employee shall go through the formalities in 3 working days upon the completion of the sick leave, otherwise, the employee’s absence shall be deemed as absenteeism. Mr. Wang asked for an emergency sick leave, but he failed to go through the formalities. Six months later, Company A terminated Mr. Wang’s labor contract with the reason that his absence should be deemed as absenteeism, which had severely violated the company’s rules and regulations. Mr. Wang filed the dispute to the labor arbitration committee.…

Company A planned to engage in the production and sale of a particular device, and filed an application to the authority for qualification. During the examination period, Company B which is the competitor of Company A, brought a lawsuit on the dispute over the utility model patent infringement against Company A. In addition, Company B reported to the authority. Company B insisted that Company A was involved in an IPR infringement case, so it failed to meet the approval requirements. The strange thing was that the involved utility model patent was lack of novelty as prescribed in the patent evaluation…

Mr. Wang is the dormant shareholder of a Jiangsu company. He has made the capital contribution to the company, and received dividends for several times. Because he had doubts on the calculation of the company’s profit, he filed an application in written to the company on reviewing the accounting books. However, the company refused his request. Then Mr. Wang filed a lawsuit against the company on the violation of shareholder’s right to know. Finally, Mr. Wang won the lawsuit. The dormant shareholder of a Beijing company, Mr. Zhang has faced the same situation, and filed the same lawsuit, but he…