On November 10^th, 2017, the Shanghai High People’s Court issued its final judgment in a case in which Wind Information Technology Co., Ltd (“Wind Information”) and Nanjing Information Technology Co., Ltd (“Nanjing Wind”) sued Zhejiang Hexin RoyalFlush Network Services, Ltd. (“RoyalFlush”) for copyright infringement and unfair competition. The court upheld the lower court judgment in which RoyalFlush was found to have committed infringement. W&B Executive Partner Yang Jun and Partner He Xiaobo represented Wind Information at the appeal hearing and obtained a favorable judgment for their clients.

Five years and eleven months passed before a final judgment was issued in this case. During the first instance trial, the court ruled that RoyalFlush had illegally enhanced its competitiveness at the expense of Wind Information and the honest efforts of Nanjing Wind. The court noted that RoyalFlush exhibited all of the classic signs of “free-riding” in a manner that constituted unfair competition towards the plaintiffs. In the appeal, W&B argued that RoyalFlush’s acts had crossed the boundaries of reasonable imitation and reference by selling its products at a price far lower than similar products sold by Wind Information. The Shanghai High People’s Court upheld the original judgment of the first instance court.