China Banknote Printing Company Overturns Case at European Patent Office After Two-Year Battle

On 9 March 2026, the Technical Board of Appeal of the European Patent Office (EPO), sitting in a composition of three members, issued its final decision in case number T 0673/24, dismissing the opposition requests filed by two European counterparts and upholding the validity of European Patent EP 3 553 706, owned by China Banknote Printing and Minting Corporation (CBPMC) and its subsidiary, Zhongchao Special Security Technology Co., Ltd. (collectively referred to hereinafter as "CBPMC").

On 22 November 2017, CBPMC filed a patent application with the EPO entitled "Security Element and Security Product" (application number EP17877547.4). The patent relates to an innovative security technology, the core of which lies in the fact that the magnetic signal width of the magnetic unit is smaller than its visually visible width, thereby enhancing anti-counterfeiting performance.

The EPO formally granted the patent on 22 December 2021. Following grant, Hueck Folien Gesellschaft m.b.H. from Austria and Giesecke+Devrient Currency Technology GmbH from Germany filed oppositions in September 2022 respectively, seeking revocation of the patent.

Hueck Folien Gesellschaft m.b.H. is a family-owned enterprise headquartered in Baumgartenberg, Austria, specialising in thin-film coating and providing complex surface-coating solutions to the market. Its core competencies lie in developing high-security security features required for banknotes and identification documents, such as holographic security threads and security films. Giesecke+Devrient Currency Technology GmbH is a large multinational group headquartered in Munich, Germany, with over 14,000 employees worldwide and a turnover of €3.1 billion in fiscal year 2024. It holds a global leadership position in the field of banknote security and identification systems.

On 14 March 2024, the Opposition Division of the EPO issued a decision revoking the patent for lack of novelty pursuant to Article 101(3)(b) of the European Patent Convention (EPC). CBPMC appealed against this decision before the Technical Board of Appeal of the EPO.

The core issue in the present case was whether claim 1 of CBPMC's patent possessed novelty and an inventive step.

The opponents primarily relied on two prior art documents: D2 (WO 03/002355 A1), which disclosed a security element comprising a barcode structure formed by magnetic coatings and neutral (non-magnetic) coatings; and D8 (WO 2010/006767 A2), which disclosed a data carrier having a printed security feature with reduced magnetic pigment content obtained through laser treatment. The opponents argued that the above two documents fully disclosed all the technical features of claim 1 of CBPMC's patent, and that the patent therefore lacked novelty.

In European patent opposition and appeal proceedings, when a patent is challenged, the patent proprietor usually first requests maintenance of the patent as granted (the "main request"). At the same time, in order to guard against the main request being rejected, the proprietor files multiple auxiliary requests, each imposing different limitations on the original claims to narrow the scope of protection, thereby rendering the claims more specific.

In the present case, CBPMC submitted as many as a dozen auxiliary requests (from auxiliary request 1 to auxiliary request 14a', etc.) to the board. Ultimately, auxiliary request 4 was adopted, which added to claim 1 the technical feature that "said one or more magnetic units are made of a single type of magnetic material" (feature 7). The Board provided a crucial interpretation of feature 7, holding that although the magnetic material itself may contain non-magnetic components (such as pigments and solvents in magnetic ink), the unit must consist of a single type of magnetic material.

In document D2, element 40 (magnetic) and element 50 (neutral/non-magnetic) are made of different materials; accordingly, feature 7 constituted a distinguishing feature. After confirming novelty, the Board further found, in the assessment of inventive step, that "feature 7 is the only feature that distinguishes the subject-matter of claim 1 from the disclosure of document D2" (as expressly stated in the decision).

Ultimately, the Technical Board of Appeal of the EPO, in its composition, decided to set aside the Opposition Division's decision of 14 March 2024 revoking the patent; and to remit the case to the Opposition Division for further prosecution, ordering it to maintain the patent in force on the basis of the claims of auxiliary request 4 filed by CBPMC on 13 February 2023, together with the description and drawings as adapted thereto.

This case represents a significant victory for a Chinese enterprise on the European intellectual property battlefield. As the flagship national team in China's minting market, CBPMC has accumulated over 360 invention patent applications to date, including more than 90 international patents. This victory in defending its European patent not only consolidates its technological moat and commercial interests in the global high-end security market, but also demonstrates the independent research and development capabilities and international competitiveness of Chinese enterprises in the field of security features.