Electrical Engineering Department  Mr. Tao CHEN  
Chemistry & Biotechnology Department  Ms. Xi CHEN  
Chemistry & Biotechnology Department  Mr. Yan WANG 
Chemistry & Biotechnology Department  Ms. Jing ZUO
Mechanical Engineering Department  Mr. Xianhua SHEN 

Time flies, and Linda Liu & Partners is about to embrace its thirteenth anniversary. In this warm summer, every one of us, just like the summer leaves which need to strive to absorb water and sunshine, needs to enrich and tranquil ourselves. Each of us needs to move forward through daily work to constantly improve and challenge ourselves in daily lives. Upon the arrival of our thirteenth anniversary, five members of Linda Liu & Partners had a pleasant communication based on their understandings of Linda Liu & Partners and their future prospects. We would like to share their conversation with you and sincerely hope you will find it interesting and inspiring.

The theme of the conversation: Understanding Linda Liu & Partners, and prospecting the future

Xianhua SHEN: Time flies! At the blinking of eyes, it is my 6th years at Linda Liu & Partners. Before that, I was an examiner at the State Intellectual Property Office of China (hereinafter referred to as “SIPO”) and all of my knowledge of Linda Liu & Partners back then came from the cases I heard. At that time, my impression for Linda Liu & Partners was high quality, comprehensive reply to OA, and perfection of the format and content of the cases. Looking back now, I recall that not a single case I heard from Linda Liu & Partners was rejected. Therefore, even after joining Linda Liu & Partners, I was still exploring the reasons why Linda Liu & Partners can maintain such high quality of its cases. Now, I finally figured out. The high quality came from the team work, insistency on the principle of honesty, the optimistic attitude, and the cultivation of talented individuals.

Tao CHEN: I also experienced about the teamwork and collaboration at Linda Liu & Partners myself. I used to be an examiner at the Patent Examination Cooperation Center of SIPO where I worked alone. After joining Linda Liu & Partners in 2012, I experienced the transition of thinking styles from an examiner to a patent attorney, as well as from working alone to working in a team. At the first few years after joining Linda Liu & Partners, my main work was to reply to OA and write new applications. The working procedure of a new application at Linda Liu & Partners includes translation, first review, second review, and the final approval. This team work system 
guarantees the quality of the work. In terms of OA, each new patent attorney is assigned to a mentor and a supervisor, and even sophisticated attorney is assigned to a supervisor. This review system guarantees the comprehension and perfection of each reply to an OA. When I was a new patent attorney, my mentor not only taught me many good working methods and working habits, but also how to reflect my understanding of technologies into replying an OA as well as delivering it to clients to ensure the comprehensiveness of my work. When I became a mentor, I also tried my best to pass my working habits, reflection and summary of the questions I encountered at work to my new colleagues. I discussed with them on which direction to argue in each OA through team work. 

Yan WANG: In terms of individuals and teams, there is a quite worldly saying to describe – “mutual utilization”, because everyone is contributing something to the team and obtaining something from the team. Today’s Linda Liu & Partners has formed a relatively mature and completed management system. Just like a sophisticated machine, everyone performs a duty, and once in the system, all each person needs to do is focus on his or her specialty and achieve the best result of his or her work.

Furthermore, as far as I am concerned, Linda Liu & Partners also redefined the relationship between individuals and teams. In addition to mutual utilization, the relationship is more about mutual accomplishment, especially for me, even though I haven’t made much accomplishment (laugh), but Linda Liu & Partners did help me a lot in many areas. To be honest, when I was a patent examiner, I was quite confident with my professional skills, especially at the academic level, as I am familiar with Guidelines for Patent Examination and various articles and subjects by heart. However, when I became a real patent attorney, I realized that I am far from a qualified patent attorney, and the gap between us exists on many different levels, including technology knowledge, legal knowledge, language expression and other aspects, and among which, the most important one is the difference in the vision. In the process of hearing cases as an examiner, I only focused on the technical and the legal questions of the case. It was after joining Linda Liu & Partners that I got chances to have direct contact with clients, to access the stories behind the cases, and to understand how patents are created, how patent rights are confirmed, and how the rights are executed. This gives me an entirely different understanding of the patent system and the patent attorney industry.   
 
At present, I am still learning, learning the technologies, the law and the language. Being a member of Linda Liu & Partners, I can see the difference between me and a sophisticate, independent and excellent patent attorney. That is why I think Linda Liu & Partners helped me and accomplished me. This kind of accomplishment is not shown by a position or fortune, but by how it helped me redefine my “individual benchmark” in the field. It makes me think and realize the differences between me and the best patent attorneys and find my own path in the patent field through my experience and reflection at Linda Liu & Partners. 

Xi CHEN: I think that teamwork is especially important in cases involving high-tech. Take biotechnology field where I specialized in as an example, the technology in the entire biotechnology field grow rapidly in recent years, and many of our clients work in very cutting-edge technical fields, therefore it is unrealistic to expect a patent attorney to comprehensively grasp every aspects of the technology in the field. In the meantime, the Guidelines for Patent Examination has many special requirements for the biotechnology field, and in the real examination, every examiner holds different standards for these requirements, correspondingly we should consider from many different angles. Therefore, comparing to other works, for the cutting-edge and complicated biotechnology cases, the managers will gather the patent attorney of the case and others who are experienced in the specialized field to discuss the case, and come up with a solution that maximize the interests of the applicant under the practice in China, based on thorough understandings of technology solutions, experience from past cases, and collaborative teamwork.

Xianhua SHEN: Indeed. Besides biotechnology field, our firm forms teams in every field that is comparatively complicated. Take patent legal cases for an example, our firm will form a team, which includes the patent attorneys who will attend the oral hearing and other experienced patent attorneys, have rehearsals and brainstorm questions that may be raised during an oral hearing. Even for a simple reply to a consultation of patent legal issues, at least two colleagues will jointly work together. Everyone has a different angle, and teamwork makes our suggestions more objective and accurate.     

What’s more, patent attorneys and colleagues in Docketing Department and Translation Department formed a strong team on the macro level. Docketing Department controls the deadline and ensuring the execution of the procedure while Translation Department supports the patent attorneys in translating different languages, they collaborate with each other and help each other, perform their respective duties, and ensure the efficiency.  

Jing ZUO: When Xianhua SHEN shared his experience, he said that both the formality and the material of the cases from Linda Liu & Partners are of high quality. To be honest, it is my first time to hear such a comment the impression of Linda Liu & Partners in the eye of an examiner. For the “macro team” concept Xianhua SHEN mentioned, I have a deep understanding and experience myself as a secretary. I once worked as an undertaker in the Legal Department. All I cared about was how to control the deadlines and how to perfect my letter and improve the clients’ experience, but I had no idea what the actual cases were like and what kind of work were high quality. Now I am a secretary specialized in Japanese, my job is to translate OA, from which I gained a deeper understanding of the work of a patent attorney, a job that requires hard work and understanding of high-technology, a position which needs to communicate between patent examiners and applicants to fight for the maximum interests of an applicant. It is quite a difficult job. Now, through cooperation with patent attorneys, I am no longer at the surface of routine work. I immersed my experience with clients into my current work, broadened and deepened the scope of my job. Teamwork is very important to my work. For those sentences that I cannot ensure, I often confirm with the Japanese patent attorneys, who are very patient to teach me even when they are not on the case. Together we would completely understand the instructions from the clients, accurately handle the cases, and thoroughly fulfill the clients’ requirements during work.  

Xianhua SHEN: Speaking of clients, I think the reason why we can maintain high quality lies in our persistency in executing the principle of “honest and trustworthy”. “Honest and trustworthy” is the core principle of our firm motto, and the primary value that Linda and Mr. Wei have been telling us at Linda Liu & Partners. Mr. Wei often reminds us that we cannot hide problems and must face problems so that we can solve the problems and never let them happen again. Mr. Wei once told us that when the firm was newly founded, there was a client who wanted to us to file a large quantity of applications, but Linda refused the client, and told the client honestly that that we could not handle that number of cases due to the limited number of patent attorneys we had back then in our firm.

Everyone makes mistakes, but the patent attorneys at Linda Liu & Partners admit their mistakes honestly to the clients, and always instruct the clients how to avoid such mistakes from happening again. For the mistakes that we have made, our firm will brainstorm solutions to correct the mistakes, and if possible, we will visit clients personally and explain the situations with clients and discuss possible solutions to the problems. Our attitude of treating and handling mistakes is superior among our Chinese peers.    

Yan WANG: Since we are talking about clients, we have to talk about the current market environment in China. In the past, we often say that patent attorneys made fortunes silently because of the little social attention, high qualification requirement and little competition. However, with the increasing number of patent applications and the increasing popularity of the concept of “Internet plus”, we found that more and more capitals and talented individuals are pouring into the patent attorneys market, the number of patent attorneys and firms increased dramatically. In this market of overly rapid development, or even abnormally developed market, some strange phenomenon occurred, such as “free or low price service fees” or “RMB 8,000 vouch for authorization”. We, as the insider, usually laugh at this abnormal phenomenon; however, it is undeniable that many clients do not understand patent system enough. This kind of twisted advertising strategy lowered the industry qualification of patent attorneys, carved up the client resource and fostered some firms.

I still think that the market will be mature eventually and get back to the right track. The clients will become mature along with the development of the market, and it will not take long. When the market stands the test of various temptations and becomes mature, the clients will screen the patent law firms as well as patent attorneys with clearer purposes. Therefore the first things we need to do are improve our professional skills, maintain our strength, and fix our weakness, thus make ourselves more attractive. In addition, I think it is important to raise our reputation in the field, but it cannot be done by those twisted advertising strategy. Instead, it should be done by improving the quality of our cases, by our academic research, let our professionalism speak, and let the experts hear our voice.

Jing ZUO: About this point, I have an example of myself. There was a time when I missed a sentence when translating a client’s instruction. Upon discovering this mistake, I went to the patent attorney and apologized, he did not blame me. Even though leaving the sentence untranslated did not cause any negative consequence, the patent attorney decided to write an apology letter to the client to report this mistake. This thing impressed me a lot. From my own perspective, I found a mistake, honestly communicated with a colleague, and obtained my colleague’s understanding. And the patent attorney honestly reported the error to a client, explained the details and possible consequences, and he also received the client’s understanding.

Xi CHEN: My career at Linda Liu & Partners is relatively short compared to other senior colleagues. However, I strongly agree that such a concept as “never hide problems, and stick to the principle of honesty” has been deeply rooted into every colleague’s mind. At our firm, colleagues do not hide problems, employees and supervisors do not hide problems between each other, and we never hide problems to our clients. The reason why we discover even tiny problems and discussed openly about them is because every member of Linda Liu & Partners places the interests of the clients as priority, and sees everyone as a member of our firm.

Just like Jing ZUO has mentioned, after discovering problems, our colleagues would not blame each other and evade the responsibility, but treat the problem as joint responsibility of our group and search for solutions for clients to minimize the impact. After that, we would take corrective measures to ensure that the problems will not happen again. As a regular staff, I know that I won’t face criticism or blame after reporting a problem, but help from my colleagues and supervisors to solve the problems, and develop a better mechanism to avoid recurrence of the same problem. Therefore, for myself I would not run away from a problem when I encounter one. I think this kind of transparent and uplifting environment between colleagues, and the harmonized and mutual beneficial atmosphere that Mr. Wei constantly stressed about, are the basis of our team cooperation and honesty in such a long time.

Xianhua SHEN: Yes, Linda Liu & Partners’ s idea enables every employee to hold a positive attitude, and everyone together to create a positive atmosphere in the firm. Mr. Wei and Linda work in a positive and diligent fashion every single day and set us a great model. For example, they would continuously visit clients during long business trips, which is a hard challenge physically even for young people, let alone the senior leaders.

With the guidance from Mr. Wei and Linda, the patent attorneys at Linda Liu have a state of mind that they don’t ask for return when working, and devote all the energy into work regardless of the type of work and the person who assigns the work. In the meantime, the firm provides great return for our hard working employees. Most of the employees working at Linda Liu & Partners are satisfied with the firm support on both mental and materially level. A positive attitude has brought an atmosphere of mutual help and discussion. Whenever the patent attorneys encounter any problem, they will ask our colleagues at their own department and other departments for help, and everyone will contribute his/her ideas.

Tao CHEN: I think with this positive attitude, everyone at Linda Liu & Partners develops a spirit of reaching excellency with work. As Linda and Mr. Wei often said, we ourselves are clear about the how much effort we put into this work. If a client gives our work 80 points, we have to think about how to make it 100 points.

During the process of transformation from an examiner to a patent attorney, I met a variety of opinions, and I certainly have to think about how to deal with these opinions. During this thinking process, I discovered many things that I ignored before. For example, for the various provisions in the Guidelines for Patent Examination, I formed my own understanding in patent practice. For reviewing creativity, I used to always follow the three-step reviewing procedure to decide the inventiveness according to the Guidelines for Patent Examination when I was an examiner, but sometimes when the combination of two prior art references creates a “technical difficulties”, then the invention would be creative.

For the whole time while I was a patent examiner, I did not understand how to use the “technical difficulties” standard in practice, as there was no detailed explanation in the Guidelines for Patent Examination. It was only in continuous practice did I eventually understand that there is no need to be entangled with “technical difficulties”, and I can follow the clear and definite provision in the Guidelines for Patent Examination to argue.

With regard to the second part in section 3.2.1 (3) of Chapter 4, it is clearly stated that “during the judgment process, what to be determined is whether the current technology as a whole has certain technology inspiration, i.e., whether the current technology gives an inspiration to apply the above-mentioned distinguishing features to solve the problems of the existing technology (i.e. practical technical problems solved by the invention), such inspiration would encourage a technician in this field to improve the closest existing technology to get the claimed." This paragraph contains a lot of information. Based on this, we could put forward a lot of reason to refute. For example, if the invention to solve the technical problem does not exist in the latest current technology, or distinctive features cannot be combined with the closest existing technology, or even the combination cannot achieve the purpose of the invention for the closest current technology, it should be regarded as no technology inspiration.

Although these understandings are my personal view, but this has achieved great results in the process of handling OA, and the success rate of the argument is very high. Moreover, in the study of invalid decisions by the reviewing committee, we also found that the reviewing committee adopted this view. After I became a mentor to teach new people, I also passed my ideas and what I have learned about the spirit of working until you reach “one hundred points at work”, to the new staff.

Yan WANG: Indeed, the passion for clients has been deeply embedded into the hearts of every person at Linda Liu & Partners. Many patent attorneys do an excellent job in normal cases by their intensive cultivation. Here, we do not simply regard our work as a job, but as a career, a kind of pursuit. We tie the interests of clients and our career pursuit closely together.

It is exactly this kind of responsible attitude towards clients that greatly enhance our sense of responsibility and professional satisfaction. Linda Liu & Partners has gone through its thirteenth anniversaries, it has made a lot of mistakes and so did myself, but we face up to every mistake, we neither ignore nor hide them from our clients. Sometimes we think that mistakes make us lose clients, but on the contrary, what really makes us lose clients is not the mistake itself, but our attitudes towards mistakes.

Xinahua SHEN: Linda Liu’s spirit has been passed down in that way. Some companies think it is enough that the employees do their own jobs, and improving the employees’ abilities is the employees’ own business and should be at the employees’ own expenses. They consider it something outside the work itself. However, since I joined Linda Liu & Partners, I found that our firm always attaches great importance to employee training. The firm provides us with diverse training activities inside and outside the firm. First of all, it encourages us to take an active part in routine technological conferences with our clients inside the firm and professional trainings outside the firm. Besides, it does not encourage individualism, but encourages us to communicate with each other, instead of isolating oneself from others. It organizes special training at many different levels, such as within each group, each department, and within the whole firm, and focuses on different levels of patent attorneys, different problems, how to handle different clients, and how to solve problems. Everyone can select trainings depending on his or her requirements and levels of competence. Moreover, Mr. Wei and Linda personally train us. Unlike many other firms where an ordinary employee would find it difficult to have access to information held by senior managers, Mr. Wei and Linda use their personal experiences to train us on career and life, e.g., how to improve ones’ mental state, how to improve oneself, all of which become valuable treasures to us.

Tao CHEN: I experienced myself our firm’s paying more attention to how we could better serve our clients. Not long after I came here, I had opportunities to participate in greeting visiting clients. Through daily work, I deeply experienced how participating in face-to-face discussions, such as talking to visiting clients and attending telephone conferences, help with communication and building mutual trust between patent attorneys and clients. The firm made use of every opportunity to let us communicate with the clients in order for patent attorneys and clients to bond. It hopes us to be more proficient and professional so that everybody is able to handle cases by himself or herself. The more proficient we are, the more competitive the firm will be. Like what Linda always says, every attorney should leave a mark on cases that he or she handles, so that clients would remember him or her. I have always working towards that direction.

Xianhua SHEN: It is unique of our firm’s employee cultivation to encourage young talented attorneys to have direct contact with clients. Previously, it encouraged the attorneys to be participants in the contacts with the clients. Recently, it has begun to encourage patent attorneys to lead the meeting with the clients. In fact, in this field, many patent attorneys are prohibited from having direct contact with clients. Mr. Wei and Linda, however, are not afraid of it. They believe that more trust on the employees leads to greater respect to the firm and tighter bonding between the employees and the firm. At present our firm focuses more on building small platforms each consisting of a group of attorneys one of which acts as a window, in order to provide better service to the clients. The windows of attorneys through which the attorneys could communicate with the clients, I believe, can not only deepen mutual understanding and trust between our firm and its clients but also enable the attorneys to develop better.

Yan WANG: The most important thing in building a cohesive and effective team is to build trust. This means that team members must learn to share, be honest with one’s own failure and faults, and sincerely ask for help. Everybody also needs to learn how to discover and accept others’ strengths even if the strengths are superior to one’s own. In thirteen years, Linda Liu & Partners gets to where it is today all by itself because it benefited from the mutual trust between its members. At Linda Liu & Partners, we trust each other and rely on each other. This gives us the courage to expose our weaknesses when facing difficulties and to charge against difficulties, because we know our team, Linda Liu & Partners, is at our back. Every partner at our firm is not only modest but also a good listener. This makes it easy for us to form a trustworthy relationship with the firm, and makes us dare to express ourselves. Thanks to the trustworthy relationship, the firm can find its problems timely such that the team is under a virtuous circle.

Xi CHEN: Like Tao CHEN, I had opportunities to meet with clients and attend telephone and video conferences shortly after I came here. To be honest, that was far beyond my expectation, so I felt nervous at first. It was even more surprising when Linda and my department trusted me enough to let me attend the INTA annual meeting and visit our clients in the USA shortly after I had been in the firm for one year. Those experiences gave me the impression that our firm does not attach marks to its employees, such as junior, senior, professional, and commercial, but always keeps an eye on each of its members’ ability, and makes all efforts to make use of and to develop the members' abilities. At Linda Liu & Partners, your hard work would be documented, your achievements would be recognized, and every weakness you have would be overcome and remedied. I would like to express my special appreciation to the partners of my department. They have been fostering my abilities in various ways since I came here. They gave me all kinds of work to do, including businesses that I have never done before, let me discuss with the other attorneys, and encouraged me to engage in management, marketing and so on. It is extremely admirable of them to spend so much time on training the department’s members in accordance with everyone’s strengths and weaknesses when they already have a lot to do every day. I think that all the senior managers have reached a consensus on the significance of fostering and developing the abilities of employees. This consensus makes every member to be vigorous and active at his or her work, as Xianhua SHEN said just now. The abilities that each employee developed have formed a net, which guarantees the continuing, stable and healthy development of our firm.

Tao CHEN: Indeed. We all are growing with the firm. We share all of the firm’s information and are provided with various kinds of training. In practice, managers share all of their knowledge to us with absolutely no reservation, and adequately discuss in detail about each case with us. This enables every patent attorney to improve quickly and professionally. I am mainly responsible for filing new applications and replying OA, and I have dealt with many cases about invalidation and infringement at the same time. Meanwhile, our firm has expanded its business from mainly handling pre-granting cases to accurately handling post-granting cases as well now. I took part in an invalidation case recently, which deeply impressed me. In the case, we were the petitioner; we lost due to lack of experience and probably also lack of sufficient preparations. Before we filed an administrative lawsuit against the Patent Reexamination Board before the IP court, we reviewed the whole case and found some new entry points, and made detailed analysis of the main disputed issues. It was a pity that we lost again in the litigation. When we decided to appeal to the higher court, we reviewed the whole case once again. We not only thoroughly explained our points, but also quoted many relevant rules and regulations and judicial precedents from the highest court. When we met the members of the Patent Reexamination Board at the court, one of them said, “You are so eloquent.” Although the litigation is still pending, I had the feeling at the court that the judges were in favor of us. Of course, the lesson I learned from the case is that it is necessary to find all entry points from the very beginning and make as much preparations as possible in dealing with invalidation cases—admittedly, whether preparations are sufficient depends on one’s professional quality. Both our firm as a whole and everybody as individuals are constantly growing. I believe we will be more professional in handling complicated cases as our work experience accumulates day by day.

Jing ZUO: I myself have been advancing along with our firm for so many years. The thirteenth birthday of our firm is coming. I joined it when it was five immediately after graduating from my university. I did not experience the firm’s infant age, but I know, as a mom of a three-year-old, all the difficulties that an infant has to go through. I also have deep understanding of difficulties that one has to experience at various stages. I find it fortunate to be involved in the years of growth of our firm, seeing it growing from a small child into an adolescent. Not only the firm but also everyone, from Linda to the partners and to myself, everyone has been advancing both professionally and personally. What’s more, all of these are growing in a healthy way. There are so many enterprises in China, and often they go bankruptcy or change their courses as they develop. Our firm, like a big tree, has its roots straightly pointing down, and only because of this can it grow up straight to the sunlight.

At this firm, I am not a patent attorney, not an attorney at law, and not a partner, just an ordinary member. For our firm, I’m merely a person occupying a position and in charge of certain trivial affairs; for me, the firm is where I earn my bread. Recently, I received many calls from headhunting companies. Some of them recommended me positions at Japanese companies, and some of them recommended positions at other firms. I chose to decline them every single time. I often ask myself why I don’t choose those positions which might pay me more, and my answer is I don’t want to leave here. After experiencing some things, I always listen to my heart when I make choices. People often say that one should make decisions of minor significance by rationality and make decisions of great significance by heart. I can list many reasons for my unwillingness of leaving, but the most important reason is that I meet a great boss. Everybody has his or her own standards of being “good”. People like me, as an ordinary person, work to get a better life. However, working at our firm, I think I can not only live a better life but become a better person. Our firm’s being “good” is not a conclusion that I draw overnight, but my personal experience over all these years.

Xin CHEN: Before joining Linda Liu & Partners, I did Research & Development in the medical industry as well as strategic investment. Over four years of experience, I met all kinds of companies, including the subsidiary of our corporate, our business partners, our clients, and other third-party service providers. Compared to them, Linda Liu & Partners is really a “good” firm in my mind. This “good” is reflected by all the above aspects that everyone mentioned just now. It is also reflected by putting the clients’ interest in priority; by our harmonized, united, and mutual growth firm culture; and by our professional attitude of striving to be the best in the field. At our firm, I can completely devote myself into my work. On one hand, our office has comfortable facilities and great office management software, which ensure smooth progress of our work. On the other hand, there is a delighted and uplifting atmosphere around our office, and we can feel the warm support from our colleagues at any time. This is especially important to us patent attorneys whose work requires intensive mental capacity.

Yan WANG: Our firm, like a human being, has been making progress all the way. Inside Linda Liu & Partners, there is a culture that holds the philosophy of constant learning, self-examining, communication, and self-criticizing. This philosophy is an expression of our firm’s maturity and confidence. Such an excellent team expresses a deep understanding of itself and persistency in pursuing its goals. It is capable of fighting difficulties and setbacks that it meets along the way. In such a team with fast communication and least costs, abundant trust and little complaint, team players’ abilities grow rapidly.

Jing ZUO: I have a scene in my mind. Few years ago, Mr. Wei said to us in a training room and impressed me very much until today, “We must not only manage the firm well, but be able to let every young person here live a better life and be well paid now and in the future. Or else, what are they going to do about their mortgage loans and to bring up their offspring?” At that time, my respect to this boss, who is as old as my grandfather, grew even stronger for the heavy burden he carried on his shoulder. Days ago, one of my university professors—a doctor of economics graduating from Japan—shared an article on his WeChat Moments. There was a sentence in the article: a boss is not merely a “wealthy” person, but one who has to stand up to difficulties and take responsibilities in running an enterprise. Immediately after reading these words, I recalled that scene, and the feeling I had since back then, that I was being cared for and being protected, the kind of security that one would only feel when the person encounters a boss like Mr. Wei. A few months ago, pictures of Mr. Zhengfei REN, the CEO of Huawei, were popular on WeChat Moments. In the pictures, Mr. REN, an old seventy, was pulling a suitcase by himself when he tried to catch his flight for a business trip. When I saw those pictures, I thought, “Isn’t that that our Mr. Wei is as well?” I met with Linda a few days ago and chatted with her. I told her that I liked working here because I liked to work with her and my colleagues together. She said that is the charm of corporate culture. Until now, I still cannot conclude what kind of corporate culture I like, and I only know that I am a simple and upright person and I would like to work in an honest, faithful and transparent atmosphere. Here we have a group of persons who love life, they are real, talented, vigorous, and positive, and they help each other in both work and life.

Xianhua SHEN: Yeah, we are all fond of our firm as such. I think every member should associate his or her life with the development of our firm, grip every opportunity that our firm provides, and demonstrate his or her ability on the platform that the firm has built. We should never stop learning, focus on continuing education, finish high-quality work product and promote ourselves at the same time, and have our names remembered by our clients. This means we should not merely finish work designated by the clients, but make the clients satisfied, create value for the clients, and earn their trust in the firm and ourselves.

Yan WANG: One’s life becomes wonderful due to one’s pursuit. I have always been waiting for more challenging and more valuable work. I was lucky to meet this firm at a right stage of my life so that I have a clear path to follow. As a member of this growing team, I enjoyed the happiness from my progress, which is far more important than the satisfaction from wealth accumulation. I also hope that in the future I will become successful due to our firm, and our firm will become stronger because of me.

Tao CHEN: I remember that when I first joined the firm, there was a time when Mr. Wei asked everyone to say something when a client visited. I said that I wanted to be an influential person in the field. Now that I look back, I think I need to continue to improve and grow, and never forget my initial determination. I hope I can grow with Linda Liu & Partners, become stronger, and benefit both myself and our firm.

Jing ZUO: Tao CHEN always smiles, so gentle and amiable. I am surprised to hear that you have such a big dream, thumbs up to your positive attitude and hard-working life style. Never forget one’s initial determination, and one will achieve his goal. I always like to use the word “sophistication” to describe life and work. I still remember when Linda said her goal was not to make the firm big but to make it sophisticated. She is really a sophisticated lady, and the firm is doing sophisticated business. Sophistication? Yes, I think she made it. She never forgot her initial determination.

Xi CHEN: I can’t agree more with what Jing ZUO said about “working at our firm makes me a better person.” At Linda Liu & Partners, I am working with the most competent, most hard-working, and most dedicated people in China’s IP industry. I agree with our firm’s philosophy, and I know that our firm will be in adamant pursuit of its philosophy by constantly examining and improving the mechanisms. Now I can clearly see a better future of our firm and myself, and that is the future that I am willing to fight for with any hard-work and efforts.