Lee, Tsai & Partners

June 30, 2019

In case of any doubt as to the application scope of an interested party to a public servant when the interested party to a public servant is being defined, a strict and restrictive interpretation should be rendered; and, therefore, directors stipulated under Article 3, Subparagraph 4 of the Law on the Recusal of Public Servants Due to Conflicts of Interest before amendment should not include independent directors (Taiwan)

2018.12.27 Angela Wu The Taipei High Administrative Court rendered the 106-Su-1300 Decision of December 27, 2018 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that in case of any doubt as to the application scope of an interested party to a public servant when […]

June 30, 2019

The requirement under a contract that if any party to the contract defaults the other party can rescind the contract and claim damages from the other party aims to cause the parties to perform the contract, and it is not true that either party may arbitrarily rescind the contract by paying the default penalty (Taiwan)

2019.3.29 Emily Chueh The Supreme Court rendered the 108-Tai-Shang-448 Civil Decision of March 29, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that the requirement under a contract that if any party to the contract defaults the other party can rescind the contract […]

June 30, 2019

Except when laws and regulations are obviously violated or when a party has produced new litigation materials sufficient to reverse the original determination, the court and the parties shall not make any opposite determination or assertion about important issues which have been determined by the court in a lawsuit filed by the same party for such important issues (Taiwan)

2019.3.14 Oli Wong The Supreme Court rendered the 107-Tai-Shang-Zi-1878 Civil Decision of March 14, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that except when laws and regulations are obviously violated or when a party has produced new litigation materials sufficient to reverse […]

June 30, 2019

To determine whether the launch of the drug at issue by an enterprise which uses a package similar to other drugs with the same functions in the market constitutes an act of unfair competition which confuses the consumers and undermines the trading order, the Supreme Court held that factors such as the business trading practices for prescription drugs, industry characteristics and the placement location of the advertisement for the drug at issue should be generally considered. (Taiwan)

2019.1.31 Elva Chuang The Supreme Court rendered the 107-Tai-Shang-1967 Civil Decision of January 31, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that if an enterprise uses an appearance or feature highly plagiarizing a well-known product of another party, exploits the fruit of […]

June 30, 2019

Legal Control over Stablecoins (Taiwan)

2019.6.17 Sean Liu There has been incessant news about Facebook’s intention to set foot in the blockchain domain and issue a stablecoin since the end of 2018. A while ago, Facebook finally released a white paper codenamed Libra and is […]

June 30, 2019

The FSC deregulated the switch from private placement for real estate securitization to public offering to promote private investment in public infrastructure (Taiwan)

2019.4.8 Jhen-Yi Chen The Financial Supervisory Commission (hereinafter, the “FSC”) promulgated the amendments to the Guidelines for Handling the Issuance of Beneficial Securities by Trustee Institutions and the Issuance of Asset-Backed Securities by Special Purpose Companies (hereinafter, the “Guidelines”) and […]

June 30, 2019

Attention should be paid to the overall feel of the entire works in order to determine if artistic or aesthetic works such as artistic works are plagiarized, and this should be based on the reactions or impressions of the general rational mass audience and is not necessitated by the examination or determination by professionals (Taiwan)

2018.12.27 Nora Shih The Intellectual Property Court rendered the 107-Xing-Zhi-Shang-Su-16 of December 27, 2018 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that attention should be paid to the overall feel of the entire works in order to determine if artistic or aesthetic works […]

June 30, 2019

The Statute for Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area cleared through three legislative readings with an increased ceiling of penalty for unauthorized investment in Taiwan by mainland China investors (Taiwan)

2019.4.9 Fang-Wei Lin The Legislative Yuan adopted Article 93-1 of the Statute for Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (hereinafter, the “Statute”) by three readings during the 8th Meeting of the 7th Session of […]

June 30, 2019

The Copyright Law is amended, and operators providing set-top boxes or Apps which link to infringing websites will be deemed copyright-infringing (Taiwan)

2019.4.16 Tiffany Hsiao The Legislative Yuan adopted amendments to Article 87 and Article 93 of the Copyright Law (hereinafter, the “Law”) during the 9th Meeting of the 7th Session of the 9th Term of the Legislative Yuan on April 16, […]

June 30, 2019

Even though a group insurance applicant has agreed with a worker not to make accurate filings, the monthly insurance salary should still be reported accurately; and since the worker cannot facilitate the occurrence of false filings or the aggravation of damage, the fault-balance principle certainly does not apply (Taiwan)

2019.3.28 Teresa Huang The Supreme Court rendered the 107-Tai-Shang-1854 Civil Decision of March 28, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that even though a group insurance applicant has agreed with a worker not to make accurate filings, the monthly insurance salary […]

June 30, 2019

If an employer retains an employment institution to provide care services to foreign workers, relevant expenses shall not be directly collected by the employment institution from the foreign workers to offset the retainer fees payable by the employers (Taiwan)

2019.3.14 Sophia Tsai The Supreme Administrative Court rendered the 108-Pan-110 Decision of March 14, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that if an employer retains an employment institution to provide care services to foreign workers, relevant expenses shall not be directly […]

June 30, 2019

In case of an employee’s exercise of a warrant with the acquisition of stock as the exercise timing, the positive difference between the closing price of the target stock on the exercise date and the subscription price of the stock shall be the income, and taxation on such basis does not violate the principle of the ability to pay (Taiwan)

2018.12.27 Yi-Shan Cheng The Taipei High Administrative Court rendered the 107-Su-905 Decision of December 27, 2018 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that in case of an employee’s exercise of a warrant with the acquisition of stock as the exercise timing, the […]

June 30, 2019

If an incompetent director still serves as a director at the end of oral arguments at the trial court, a protection institution may request the court to remove the director, and this shall not be limited to the circumstance where such director is subject to removal by court order during the tenure (Taiwan)

2019.3.27 Sean Tsou The Supreme Court rendered the 108-Tai-Shang-403 Civil Decision of March 27, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that if an incompetent director still serves as a director at the end of oral arguments at the trial court, a […]

June 30, 2019

If the entirety of the portion in a government procurement project that shall be performed by the contractor on its own under the original contract is performed by another supplier on behalf of the contractor, this would constitute a subcontract under the Government Procurement Law, but the internal relationship between the suppliers is not a pertinent issue (Taiwan)

2018.12.24 Frank Sun The Supreme Administrative Court rendered the 107-Pan-746 Decision of December 24, 2018 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that If the entirety of the portion in a government procurement project that shall be performed by the contractor on its […]

June 30, 2019

The Patent Law is amended to extend the term of a design patent from 12 years to 15 years and to enhance examination efficiency (Taiwan)

2019.4.16 Luke Hung The Legislative Yuan adopted the amendments to the Patent Law (hereinafter, the “Law”) during the 9th Meeting of the 7th Session of the 9th Term of the Legislative Yuan on April 16, 2019. The amendments are highlighted […]

May 31, 2019

Whether a bank account provider commits an offense of aiding a fraud should be determined by considering the situation of a specific case based on strict evidentiary rules, and an indefinite intent to aid the commissioning of a fraud cannot be derived simply based on the experience of ordinary people (Taiwan)

2018.12.14 Emily Chueh The Supreme Court rendered the 107-Shang-Su-191 Civil Decision of December 14, 2018 (hereinafter, this “Decision”), holding that whether a bank account provider commits an offense of aiding a fraud should be determined by considering the situation of […]

May 31, 2019

Introduction and brief review on the highlights of the Judicial Yuan’s initial draft of the Commercial Case Adjudication Law (Taiwan)

2019.5.20 Jhen-Yi Chen I. Features and important provisions of the draft Commercial Case Adjudication Law The initial draft of the draft Commercial Case Adjudication Law (hereinafter, the “Law”) released by the Judicial Yuan on March 29, 2019 has seven major […]

May 31, 2019

If messages on a price comparison platform are hyperlinked to other operators’ websites, the users should be able to learn about the sources of information with names and logos as differentiators; and, therefore, there is no deceptive act of active duping or passive concealment of important trading information (Taiwan)

2019.2.14 Sean Liu The Intellectual Property Court rendered the 107-Min-Gong-Shang-1 Civil Decision of February 14, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that the prohibited deceptive act in Article 25 of the Fair Trade Law, which provides: “Except as otherwise stipulated under […]

May 31, 2019

The statute of limitations is a rights barrier to a claim to recover a bid bond, and in case the fact associated with a recovery claim is verified, if it is asserted that the claim lapses due to the occurrence of a rights barrier, the party making such assertion shall assume the burden of proof (Taiwan)

2019.2.27 Yi-Shan Cheng The Supreme Administrative Court rendered the 108-Pan-80 Decision of February 27, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that the statute of limitations is a rights barrier to a claim to recover a bid bond, and in case the […]

May 31, 2019

Although food labeling, promotions or advertisements are constitutionally protected for freedom of speech, still reasonable and appropriate restrictions may be imposed on food information for its material relevance to national health (Taiwan)

2019.3.14 Angela Wu The Taipei High Administrative Court rendered the 107-Su-1416 Decision of March 14, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), although food labeling, promotions or advertisements are constitutionally protected for freedom of speech, still reasonable and appropriate restrictions can certainly be […]

May 31, 2019

In case a court’s division of a real property jointly owned by two parties has taken into account the actual circumstance of use and meets the interest of both parties, if the division method is not apparently inappropriate, inappropriate citation of evidence or fact-finding should not be used as a ground for appealing to the Supreme Court (Taiwan)

2019.3.13 Frank Sun The Supreme Court rendered the 107-Tai-Shang-850 Civil Decision of March 13, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that in case a court’s division of a real property jointly owned by two parties has taken into account the actual […]

May 31, 2019

If a party cannot substantiate the purposes of a cash withdrawal and the funding sources of his/her child’s deposit, and that an agency findsthat the party converts the money withdrawn from his/her account into a certificate of deposit of his/her child in a short proximity of time, the agency has fulfilledthe burden of proof to substantiate the criteria for imposing gift taxes (Taiwan)

2019.2.21 Fang-Wei Lin The Supreme Administrative Court rendered the 108-Pan-76 Decision of February 21, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that when a party cannot substantiate the purposes of a cash withdrawal and the funding sources of his/her child’s deposit, and […]

May 31, 2019

Although an administrative agency has its disposition authority at the time of its administrative disposition, if it fails to differentiate variedfacts of legal violation, the gist of discretion mandated by law would not be fulfilled. In this connection, the exercise of such disposition authority would be reckless, resulting in discretionary laziness, and such disposition would also be illegal (Taiwan)

2019.2.14 Oli Wong The Taipei High Administrative Court rendered the 107-Su-1122-Zi Decision of February 14, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that although an administrative agency has its disposition authority at the time of its administrative disposition, still if it fails […]

May 31, 2019

The calculation of a base rent should be based not only on the declared land value of the base but also on the location of the base and should be compared with the rents for neighboring lands, and it is not necessarily required to set the base rent at ten percent annual interest on the total declared land value, which should be the highest standard (Taiwan)

2018.12.19 Teresa Huang The Taiwan High Court rendered the 107-Chung-Shang-682 Civil Decision of December 19, 2018 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that the calculation of a base rent should be based not only on the declared land value of the base […]

May 31, 2019

If a complaint is filed to demolish a building which is not divided and whose ownership is not registered, all of the inheritors shall be identified as the defendants in order to have appropriate defendants and the current occupant shall not be identified as the sole defendant (Taiwan)

2018.12.13 Yi-Shan Cheng The Supreme Court rendered the 107-Tai-Shang-2124 Civil Decision of December 13, 2018 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that if a complaint is filed to demolish a building which is not divided and whose ownership is not registered, all […]

May 31, 2019

A freight forwarder contract is not required for giving legal effect; express or implicit agreement both suffice unless the parties had agreed on a specific method (Taiwan)

2019.2.26 Ankwei Chen The Taiwan High Court rendered the 106-Hai-Shang-Shang-9 February 26, 2019 (the “Decision”), holding that a freight forwarders contract is not required in law for giving effect to a shipment agreement; express or implicit agreement may both suffice […]

May 31, 2019

If it has been impossible for a contractor to construct the project pursuant to the contract and the project owner has failed to fulfill the obligation to collaborate by failing to provide an explanation or change the design after being notified by the contractor to provide an explanation or design change or applying for construction suspension for several times, the contractor can certainly rescind the contract and claim damages (Taiwan)

2018.12.5 Jonathan Chao The Supreme Court rendered the 107-Tai-Shang-1610 Civil Decision of December 5, 2018 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that if it has been impossible for a contractor to construct the project pursuant to the contract and the project owner […]

May 31, 2019

Since the oath texts required for the oath which should be taken for the testimony of a witness and for the opinions of an expert witness is different, their identity should certainly be differentiated and they should be required to take oath; and if there is any violation of the oath, the testimony or expert opinions can hardly be admitted as legitimate evidentiary materials (Taiwan)

2019.3.7 Jhen-Yi Chen The Supreme Court rendered the 107-Tai-Shang-3087 Criminal Decision of March 7, 2019 (hereinafter, this “Decision”), holding that since the oath texts required for the oath which should be taken for the testimony of a witness and for […]

May 31, 2019

Unless a specification has clearly indicated that the patent claims should be limited to embodiments and drawings, the restrictive conditions of the specification and drawings should not read on the patent claims (Taiwan)

2019.3.8 Hsiao-Han Su The Supreme Administrative Court rendered the 108-Pan-100 Decision of March 8, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Decision”), holding that unless a specification has clearly indicated that the patent claims should be limited to embodiments and drawings, the restrictive conditions […]

May 31, 2019

Interpretation on Article 5, Paragraph 2, Subparagraph 6 of the Employment Service Law (Taiwan)

2019.3.21 Tiffany Hsiao The Ministry of Labor issued the Lao-Dong-Fa-Jiu-10805036151 Circular of March 21, 2019 (hereinafter, the “Circular”) to interpret Article 5, Paragraph 2, Subparagraph 6 of the Employment Service Law. Article 5, Paragraph 2, Subparagraph 6 of the Employment […]