Areas of practice
Mr. Ben Ni specializes in intellectual property litigations, involving disputes over patents, trade secrets, copyright, technology-related antitrust, trademarks and unfair competition.
Mr. Ni has extensive hands-on experience in patent infringement and invalidation disputes, especially in the sectors of computer science, telecommunications and mechanics. Mr. Ni has represented a number of multi-national companies such as Qualcomm, SAP, Siemens, ABB, Ericsson and Philips in IP disputes.
Leveraging his solid academic and professional background and good communications skills, Mr. Ni always meets the need of clients by offering timely and practical advice to them.
Mr. Ni was a key team member which assisted a telecommunication giant in reaching a landmark licensing program with a mobile phone terminal manufacturer through a series of patent infringement litigations. Mr. Ni also helped an ERP software leader enforce its copyrights multiple times in criminal and civil actions. Mr. Ni also specializes in complex intellectual property cases with high professional requirements. He has successfully advocated for a number of clients in several high profile and award winning cases, including the following Top IP Cases in China as judged by courts in various provinces and cities.
- Advised SAP (the plaintiff) to successfully enforce its copyright in computer software and textbook works. The case was listed among the "20 Typical Cases of 2016" by tried by the Shanghai IP Court.
- Acted for the plaintiff, Statens Serum Institute, in a patent infringement dispute. The case was conducive to improving appearance of experts in court, the judicial appraisal system and reasonable use of expert opinions in resolving difficulties in hearing of patent cases, and was selected among the "2016 Top 10 IP Cases in Guangdong".
- Counseled on a trademark infringement dispute in respect of the well-known trademark "Ariston". The fair judgment can be a useful guide to conflict between a registered trademark and a well-known trademark, and represents an effective crackdown on malicious counterfeiting of well-known trademarks. The case was among the "2016 Top 10 IPR Judiciary Protection Cases" tried by the Jiangsu Higher Court.
Mr. Ni also advises clients on alternative dispute resolutions involving due diligence, licensing negotiations, designated intellectual property systems and commercial strategies.
Work experience
Mr. Ni joined King & Wood Mallesons ("KWM") in 2010 after gaining more than three-year experience in patent prosecution.
Mr. Ni received his B.S. from Nanjing University and also received an LL.B. in Intellectual Property Law from Renmin University of China. Mr. Ni acquired his LL.M. program at the Max-Planck Institute for Intellectual Property and Competition Law in 2009.
Mr. Ni was admitted to the PRC Bar and PRC Patent Bar in 2007.
Mr. Ni's working languages are Chinese and English.
