The International Trade Commission its publishing its notice of a limited exclusion order and cease and desist order against some Samsung mobile devices that infringe Apple’s patents in the Aug. 15 Federal Register. The commission issued the orders on Aug. 9 (see 13081202). Lawyers previously told us they believed the Samsung import bans won’t be affected by U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman's veto of an ITC ruling that would have banned early-model Apple iPhones and iPad (see 13080814). The patents involved in this case aren’t standard-essential patents (SEPs). The ITC is setting bond at 1.25 percent of the entered value of infringing Samsung mobile devices during the 60-day period for USTR to review the import ban.
U.S. Trade Representative (USTR)
The U.S. cabinet level position that oversees trade negotiations with other countries. USTR is part of the Executive Office of the President. It also administers Section 301 tariffs.
The U.S. Trade Representative's (USTR) decision to overturn an International Trade Commission ruling surprised the patent litigation community, members of which said the decision could have substantial implications for cases on standard essential patents (SEPs) at the ITC. But lawyers said the case was unlikely to have a major impact on the bulk of the ITC's caseload, or on its larger role in patent litigation. They said the ban would likewise not impact two connected patent disputes between Apple and Samsung that are set to advance Aug. 9. Industry analysts told us the USTR decision would create more uncertainty in the industry, but wouldn't overwhelmingly affect any one company's business model.
While the decision to rescind General System of Preferences (GSP) status for Bangladesh is considered to be largely symbolic, the change is expected to reverberate among the U.S. business community, observers say. Although individual U.S. interests vary depending on scope and scale of specific relationships with Bangladeshi manufacturers, some U.S. importers will likely be forced to foster different manufacturing sources in the coming months. The United States Trade Representative (USTR) decided in late June to rescind GSP status for the South Asian nation (see 13062820) following a series of labor disasters in Bangladesh over the past year, culminating in the April 24 Rana Plaza factory fire that claimed nearly 1,200 lives
A majority of stakeholders urged caution in possibly extending Generalized System of Preferences benefits to Myanmar (Burma) in comments filed us the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR). They said the country’s progress towards good governance, while admirable, is tenuous and remains fraught with concerns over worker’s rights and military power. The USTR posted comments on its review to extend GSP to Myanmar (Burma) and Laos May 22. USTR is holding a public hearing in connection with its review June 4 (see 13041521).
Trade Promotion Authority is essential to securing passage of the Trans Pacific Partnership, and despite House Ways and Means staff efforts to craft a TPA bill, the Fast Track negotiating authority won’t be realized without Presidential leadership, a group of former U.S. Trade Representatives said May 20. While TPP negotiations are complex -- tackling special interests like dairy and sugar, as well as the potential inclusion of Japan -- the talks can be completed by the October deadline, the former officials said at a panel during the U.S. New Zealand Pacific Partnership Forum. Without Fast Track negotiating authority, however, that’s unlikely to happen, they said.
Promoting the free flow of data and better understanding of U.S. privacy standards should be priorities for the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative in trade negotiations with the EU, trade associations said in response to a call from the USTR for comments on an upcoming trade negotiation between the U.S. and the EU. Public Knowledge advocated that the negotiations -- named the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership Agreement (TTIP) -- remain open and not interfere with U.S. copyright law reform.
President Obama nominated his law school classmate and current Deputy National Security Advisor Mike Froman to be the next U.S. Trade Representative, and longtime fundraiser Penny Pritzker, billionaire and Hyatt Hotels family descendant, to be Commerce Secretary May 2.
Although the Supreme Court's ruling in Kirtsaeng v. Wiley centered on imported books, the ruling will have an impact across a wide variety of products, said industry experts. The long struggle over application of the copyright first sale doctrine includes court cases on products as diverse as watches and shampoo. Kirtsaeng doesn't end that struggle either; it will now shift away from the courts to different forums, they said. But regardless of the ebbs and flows of the battles over parallel market imports, the focus for importers will remain due diligence to prevent intellectual property violations.
Governments need to move away from blunt mechanisms like the “Great Firewall of China” as they consider how to regulate the international flow of data and other aspects of e-commerce, said Jonathan McHale, deputy assistant U.S. Trade Representative (USTR)-Telecom and Electronic Commerce Policy, during a Brookings Institution event Feb. 26. The Internet’s reputation for being “notoriously resistant” to borders has made it difficult for governments to impose anything other than such blunt mechanisms, but they are “a very inefficient way of being able to participate in what’s obviously an enormously innovative and economically important sector,” he said. “We have to rethink what are reasonable rules that will allow governments to have an impact on what happens to data, despite the fact that they don’t have jurisdiction over necessarily where the data is located or where the servers are.” The worst thing that could happen is a repeat of the “Balkanized” telecommunications network that resulted from governments nationalizing their portions of the global telegraph network for strategic reasons, McHale said.
The 15th round of Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations are more secretive than previous rounds, said a joint statement from a group of stakeholders attending the negotiations. Unlike previous rounds of negotiations, the most recent of which took place in Leesburg, Va., stakeholders are allowed on the premises during negotiations only on one of the ten days, said the group, which includes the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Knowledge Ecology International and Consumers International. The negotiations are at the SkyCity Convention Centre in Auckland, New Zealand.