Wait, correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't patents only valid in the country they are filed in? So to be able to enforce a patent, you'd need to have filed in the US, Europe and China(?). Also patents take a couple of years to get accepted...
The last action one of my previous employers took was to send me payments for a patent I'm named on when they filed it in the EU. I had already quit, but it was easier to just send me the check than to cancel it :-)