Dan Harris of Harris Bricken’s China Law Blog writes that when foreign companies sign dual language contracts without knowing exactly what the Chinese language portion of their contract says, they are engaging in risky business.

He explains: “Many dual language Chinese-English contracts are silent on which language controls. For some unknown reason, foreign companies far too often just assume that the English language portion controls or they just assume that it does not matter because the meaning of both the English and the Chinese portions is exactly the same. Wrong, wrong, wrong.”

He writes that Chinese companies love using a contract with an English portion that is more favorable to the foreign company than the Chinese portion and then relying on the English speaking company to assume that the English language portion will control.

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China employee non-compete agreements and provisions are an often-litigated area, writes Grace Yang in China Law Blog.

“Many employers (wrongly) assume that they cannot prevail in such a dispute because employees usually win,” she explains. “This belief is not only wrong, but also risky. It is wrong because Chinese courts do not automatically side with the employee; those rare employers that have done things the right way actually usually win. It is also risky because employers with this attitude and approach tend to do an even poorer job of making sure they have a well-crafted contract, complying with the law and preserving good evidence, which are keys to employer success in any employee dispute.”

She describes a case involving China employee non-competes and offers some key lessons to be learned.

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When heading off to China, foreign companies all too often make the mistake of trying to protect their IP from China by using a U.S.-style non-disclosure agreement (NDA), writes Dan Harris of Harris Moure. In a new article on the website of Forbes, he explains how to protect intellectual property from China with a China appropriate NNN (non-use, non-disclosure, non-circumvention) agreement.

The article focuses on why U.S.-style NDA agreements do not work for China.

“The Chinese company that steals your idea does not do so to reveal it to the general public. It steals your idea to use for its own benefit. This means that your contract with Chinese companies must make clear that whether the information provided is a secret or not, the Chinese factory agrees not to use the information in competition with you.” he writes.

Read the article.