Shanghai fair wraps up amid booming domestic tech trade

The First China (Shanghai) International Technology Fair (CSITF) closed Saturday, wrapping up a four-day global platform to showcase and exchange the latest technologies in intelligent manufacturing, new energy sources, environmental protection and food safety.

As one of the nation's four State-level exhibitions, CSITF attracted a total of 30,000 visitors from around the world and 319 companies from 31 countries and regions, including 199 overseas firms, according to figures from Shang Yuying, director of the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce.

China's foreign trade in technology stood at $73.6 billion in transaction value last year, up from $3.6 billion in 1978, while the domestic technology exchange market stood at 634.7 billion yuan ($103.27 billion), up 35.1 percent from 2011, Wang Weizhong, vice minister of science and technology, said at the CSITF opening ceremony Wednesday.

A booming technology exchange market has saved domestic firms from high-cost and time-consuming research and development of innovative technologies, and helped them efficiently shift from labor-intensive business modes to technology-intensive ones, Walter Ortmüller, COO of Asia intellectual property (IP) transfer with PATEV, a European leader for IP management services, told the Global Times.

However, many exhibitors at the fair expressed concerns about the underdeveloped legal mechanism for IP rights protection in the country, which they viewed as a prerequisite for a healthy technology market.

Chen Hong, patent counsel with fair participant DeBund Law Offices, told the Global Times that given the high cost of suing for IP rights in China, many poorly-funded firms are vulnerable to disputes over IP rights, which makes them less likely to participate in the technology exchange market. "That may be a stumbling block to the country's technology transfer market."