IPO Shield — Defending a Legacy Appliance Maker Against a Patent Siege

The client is a domestic mid-market appliance manufacturer with over twenty years of history, producing a wide range of small appliances spanning grilling, cooking and heating. After two unsuccessful prior attempts, the client was approaching its third bid for a main-board listing when it suddenly received two patent-infringement warning letters from a leading industry competitor, accusing the client's flagship products of infringing two of the competitor's core patents.

The competitor then filed infringement actions before the Beijing IP Court based on those two patents, with combined damages claims of RMB 2 million. Over the following two years, four further waves of 14 patent-infringement lawsuits were filed before the Hangzhou and Guangzhou IP Courts. In total, 11 patents (invention, utility model and design) were asserted, with cumulative damages claims reaching RMB 31 million, alongside multiple takedown complaints on Tmall, JD and other e-commerce platforms. The competitor's intent — to disrupt the CSRC listing review and the client's platform operations during a critical IPO window — was plainly evident.

For the two Beijing cases, we adopted an "invalidation-first + administrative litigation to the end" strategy: completed prior-art searches rapidly, secured full invalidation of both asserted patents in June and August 2021, then carried the opposing administrative litigation through first instance, appeal and retrial — all the way to the Supreme People's Court's denial of retrial — uprooting the asserted patents entirely.

For the five Hangzhou design-patent cases, we focused on the plaintiff's failure to submit a patent right evaluation report within the reasonable period, filed a defense with supporting prior-design references, and argued instability of the asserted rights. For the one case that proceeded to substantive review, we combined design-space analysis with partial differences in the designs to show — under the "overall observation, comprehensive judgment" principle — that the accused design was not similar to the patented design.

For the three Guangzhou cases, we deployed a dual-track plan — "invalidation first + non-infringement defense in parallel". The first asserted patent was invalidated by the CNIPA before trial, forcing the plaintiff to withdraw. The second and third cases went to hearing before the invalidation decisions; we focused argument on the distinguishing technical features and forcefully rebutted the damages basis.

Beyond the litigation itself, we simultaneously handled five Tmall and one JD platform complaints — drafting appeal letters and infringement-comparison tables, and supporting on-site submission of materials. The entire cadence was kept in sync with the CSRC review, ensuring clear, stable litigation summaries could be filed with regulators at every stage.

This case exemplifies Kangrui's representation of pre-IPO companies under competitive patent sniping. From the Beijing pair's "first instance through retrial" path, to the Hangzhou five's leverage of evaluation-report procedure, to the Guangzhou three's "invalidation + non-infringement" pairing, the case showcases Kangrui's full-spectrum scheduling capacity in patent litigation.

For companies preparing to list, patent litigation uncertainty is among the hardest variables to manage in an IPO timeline. The cadence approach demonstrated here — "stabilize the legal opinion first → file invalidations → align with litigation rhythm → unify response to platform complaints" — offers a reusable methodology for similar risk profiles.