TWO 5G experts who previously worked at Chinese telecom giant ZTE have been sentenced on charges of infringing upon trade secrets in what was the country’s first criminal case involving intellectual property rights infringement of 5G technology.

The case, heard by the People’s Court of Nanshan District, has recently been selected as a typical case of intellectual property crimes by the Guangdong Provincial Procuratorate in 2019, oeeee.com reported yesterday.

The two former ZTE engineers, surnamed Huang and Wang, privately accepted a technology outsourcing project of 5G active antenna prototype for a research institute.

They delivered the prototype along with relevant technical documentation to the institute, receiving a total amount of 2.35 million yuan (US$331,345) as remuneration, the report said.

After appraisal, the delivered technical documents were found to belong to ZTE and are confidential technical information, with an assessed value of up to 4.3 million yuan.

In June 2019, the Procuratorate of Nanshan District filed an indictment with the court against Huang and Wang for alleged infringement of trade secrets.

Huang and Wang were convicted of violating trade secrets and both sentenced to three years in prison and four years probation, as well as a fine of 150,000 yuan. Both accused pleaded guilty to the charges and neither appealed.

It is revealed in the case that both Huang and Wang are experts in the field of communication technology. Huang started his own business after leaving ZTE in 2016. The main business of Huang’s company, a State-level high-tech enterprise, involves the independent research and development of unmanned aerial vehicle image transmission technology.

After negotiations, Huang and Wang eventually compensated ZTE for its losses and obtained an understanding from the company. Based on this, the Nanshan court allowed the two defendants to obtain a guarantor pending trial so as to minimize the impact on the companies involved, the report said.

(Zhang Yu)