International Trade in the 2020 Elections – Meh
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China Unreliable Entity Regulations
On September 19, China’s Ministry of Commerce (“MOFCOM”) issued the Regulations on Unreliable Entity List (“Regulations”), which took effect on the same date. Though we have not seen an actual list of unreliable entities, the Regulations set out the general principles for the Unreliable Entity List (UEL) system.
Who can be included on the UEL?
The Regulations apply to foreign entities, including foreign companies, organizations or individuals. A foreign entity engaging in activities that endanger…
Proprietary Product Purchases
Purchasing proprietary products raises contracting issues not fully understood by many foreign buyers.
In the old days, the typical overseas product purchase was for something like a simple white t-shirt. This t-shirt would have a number of specifications: sizes, fabric material, fabric color, thread count, neck size, ornament, label placement and label content. For this sort of purchase, the foreign buyer typically provides the specifications and the overseas factory is required to manufacture this standard…
China Commercial Leases: Watching the Sausage Get Made
My law firm was called on to review a commercial lease for one of our regular clients. This client had been working with a local Chinese attorney on the lease but began to suspect this attorney had been “bought out” by the wealthy landlord, so they wanted us to “double-check to make sure everything was okay.”
The following is the email the lawyer on the matter wrote to our client, stripped of any identifiers:
I…
Global Law and Business Podcast – Sonu Ratra (International Impact of Women)
Listen HERE or stream on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, or Soundcloud!
The large-scale shift to telework brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic is prompting businesses around the world to explore new avenues to engage with clients and friends. Harris Bricken is no exception, and we are happy to provide this podcast series: Global Law and Business, hosted by international attorneys Fred Rocafort and Jonathan Bench.
In Episode…
What to do When U.S. Customs is Coming After You
Years ago, in Importing Goods From China: The Risks Are Rising, I wrote about how companies can recognize impending antidumping (AD) or countervailing duty (CVD) petitions. In this post I address what you as an importer, exporter or foreign producer should do if you see an AD/CVD storm looming.
The first thing you should do is determine whether the AD/CVD petition will directly hit your primary operations. The second thing you should do is figure out…
Beware of China Lawyers
Yesterday I attended a USPTO webinar, How the U.S. government can help companies protect and enforce their IP in China. It was informative and I highly encourage anyone interested in IP protection in China to attend future webinars. Moreover, it brought back memories of my own stint in the government helping American companies protect their IP in South China, in the time before specialized IP courts and when raids against counterfeiters by Chinese law…
Drafting International Contracts That Work
Got the following email from a reader curious as to how my law firm’s China lawyers draft contracts for China:
Can I ask about the wording of your law firm’s agreements in Chinese. I am a translator helping a U.S. company on its contracts and — to put it mildly — things are not going well. The deal I’m translating for has been running into a lot of trouble because the American law firm that…
Tariff Exclusions Still Available, But There’s a Catch
Last week, the U.S. Department of Commerce approved our request to exclude a client’s steel imports from the Section 232 tariff. This exclusion will translate into 25% savings for our client when importing the steel products subject to the exclusion.
What are Section 232 tariffs?
With all the talk about “China tariffs” it is easy to lose sight of the fact there are other tariffs as well, some of which have nothing to…
China Employee Dispatch and IP Protection
China places many restrictions on hiring employees using employee dispatch companies (a/k/a third party hiring agencies) and there are a number of legal issues foreign companies that go this route should consider, and IP is one of the them.
Normally, the way this system works is the foreign company and the employee dispatch company sign a contract under which the dispatch company hires as its own employee(s) who will do work for the foreign company.…