A story in yesterdays Svenska Dagbladet regarding the widespread counterfeitting and IPR theft (in Swedish) in global trade today led me to this bizarre story starring Japanese electronics giant NEC.
In 2006, Internatial Herald Tribune (among others) reported that a fake NEC had been uncovered in China. What had started as an investigation into counterfeited keyboards and recordable CD and DVD discs had bloated into something far bigger; and far more bizarre than anyone ever thought possible.
The counterfeiters had set up a parallel NEC with links to over 50 electronics factories in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. Using the NEC brand name; even carrying NEC business cards; the counterfeit NEC copied NEC products and even went as far as developing a range of consumer products such as MP3-players, DVD players and home entertainment systems. The real NEC even got complaints that they weren’t providing warranties for the fake NEC products.
“These entities are part of a sophisticated ring… …which has attempted to completely assume the NEC brand,” said Fujio Okada, the NEC senior vice president and legal division general manager in a written statement to IHT in 2006.
Now, Chinese authorities have made great improvements in their efforts to maximize IPR protection since 2004, earlier this year the National Working Group for IPR Protection presented an Action Plan on IPR Protection 2008, deploying 280 detail measures in 10 areas. The complete plan can be studied on the Intellectual Property Protection in China web site.
