Beijing: Apple iPhone Violated Chinese Patent

In Dec 2014, a small Chinese startup posted a letter online accusing Apple of infringing its patent for smartphone exterior design. In a sign of an increasingly challenging landscape for Western companies, the Chinese company—the little-known Shenzhen Baili, founded by a former Huawei Technologies Co. executive—won a surprise injunction against sales of Apple’s iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus in Beijing, although Apple said the order had been stayed pending appeal and sales remain unaffected.

The patent win is a hint of the growing challenges that Western companies are likely to face in China in coming years on multiple fronts. Chinese companies are becoming stronger competitors in their own right, and Chinese regulators are increasingly insistent that foreign firms play by Beijing’s rules. As a company geared to consumers and one of China’s favorite brands, Apple has long seemed to get a pass from regulators on the strict scrutiny that has fallen on makers of more sensitive equipment like servers and routers. Industry watchers mused over why Apple was able to sell mobile content while other foreign companies couldn’t. Many chalked it up to Chinese officials’ love for iPhones. But under President Xi Jinping, China has taken a stricter view of technologies and content that it previously gave wider berth.