Germany is a European industrial power, but also a big country in the exhibition industry. As one of the origin countries of intellectual property law, it is famous for protecting intellectual property rights and is famous for its high judicial efficiency. In recent years, as more and more Chinese enterprises have gone overseas to Germany, there have been cases of intellectual property disputes in Germany. What are the characteristics of the patent litigation system in Germany? What legal or administrative procedures can be used to enforce patent infringement rights? Is there a special court to hear patent infringement lawsuits? This article answers the above questions.

In Germany, filing a lawsuit before the CivilCourts is the most common means of protection against patent infringement. At the first instance stage, a total of 12 district courts have jurisdiction over patent infringement proceedings. If the infringement occurs in multiple places in the country (common in practice, Dusseldorf, Mannheim, Munich and Hamburg are common), the plaintiff may choose the court of jurisdiction of the case. District court is the court of choice for plaintiffs.

A fundamental feature of the German patent litigation system is the adoption of a Bifurcation system, whereby patent infringement actions and patent invalidation proceedings are heard by different courts or at different levels as a process dealing with substantive issues. In a patent infringement action involving substantive issues, no invalid defense or counterclaim may be filed on the patent in question. The question of the validity of the Patent is heard either in the Opposition Proceeding before the German Patent Office or the European Patent Office during the opposition period, or in an invalidation proceeding before the German Federal Patent Court after the end of the opposition period. All procedures are handled in Munich. The court dealing with the infringement action will consider the validity of the patent if and only if the accused infringer requests the suspension of the patent infringement proceedings due to the pending invalidation proceedings; However, in practice, the suspension of patent infringement trial proceedings is not common.

Preliminary Injunction proceedings also apply to patent infringement claims. To obtain a temporary injunction, the applicant must prove that time is "urgent." This means that applicants must act quickly when they learn of violations. The time frame for filing a petition varies depending on the court's choice, ranging from four weeks to two months. In interim injunction proceedings, unlike those dealing with substantive issues, the above distinction between patent infringement proceedings and patent invalidation proceedings applies only to a certain extent, and the court will assess the likelihood that the contested patent will be found valid in the pending patent invalidation proceedings.