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S. HRG. 110–912 

PIRATING THE AMERICAN DREAM: INTELLECTUAL 

PROPERTY THEFT’S IMPACT ON AMERICA’S 

PLACE IN THE GLOBAL ECONOMY AND STRATEGIES FOR IMPROVING ENFORCEMENT 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

SECURITY AND INTERNATIONAL TRADE AND 

FINANCE 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON 

BANKING, HOUSING, AND URBAN AFFAIRS 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

ON 

THE CONSEQUENCES OF COUNTERFEITING AND PIRACY AND STRATEGIES FOR SAFEGUARDING INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS INCLUDING CURRENT EFFORTS, AND NEWLY PROPOSED STRATEGIES 

THURSDAY, APRIL 12, 2007 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs 

( 

Available at: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/senate/senate05sh.html 

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(II) 

COMMITTEE ON BANKING, HOUSING, AND URBAN AFFAIRS 

CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut, Chairman 

TIM JOHNSON, South Dakota 

JACK REED, Rhode Island 

CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York 

EVAN BAYH, Indiana 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey 

DANIEL K. AKAKA, Hawaii 

SHERROD BROWN, Ohio 

ROBERT P. CASEY, Pennsylvania 

JON TESTER, Montana 

RICHARD C. SHELBY, Alabama 

ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah 

WAYNE ALLARD, Colorado 

MICHAEL B. ENZI, Wyoming 

CHUCK HAGEL, Nebraska 

JIM BUNNING, Kentucky 

MIKE CRAPO, Idaho 

JOHN E. SUNUNU, New Hampshire 

ELIZABETH DOLE, North Carolina 

MEL MARTINEZ, Florida 

SHAWN MAHER, Staff Director 

WILLIAM D. DUHNKE, Republican Staff Director and Counsel 

ANDREW OLMEM, Republican Counsel 

JOSEPH R. KOLINSKI, Chief Clerk and Computer Systems Administrator 

GEORGE WHITTLE, Editor 

SECURITY AND INTERNATIONAL TRADE AND FINANCE

EVAN BAYH, Indiana, Chairman 

MEL MARTINEZ, Florida, Ranking Member 

SHERROD BROWN, Ohio 

TIM JOHNSON, South Dakota 

ROBERT P. CASEY, Pennsylvania 

CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut 

MICHAEL B. ENZI, Wyoming 

ELIZABETH DOLE, North Carolina 

ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah 

JAYME ROTH, Staff Director 

JENNIFER C. GALLAGHER, Republican Staff Director 

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(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

THURSDAY, APRIL 12, 2007 

Page 

Opening statement of Chairman Bayh .................................................................. 1 

Opening statements, comments, or prepared statements of: 

Senator Martinez .............................................................................................. 3 

Senator Brown .................................................................................................. 4 

Senator Casey ................................................................................................... 5 

WITNESSES 

George V. Voinovich, U.S. Senator from the State of Ohio .................................. 6 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 29 

Moise ́s Naı ́m, Editor in Chief, Foreign Policy Magazine ...................................... 11 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 30 

Response to written questions of: 

Senator Bayh ............................................................................................. 60 

Loren Yager, Director of International Affairs and Trade, Government Accountability Office ................................................................................................ 14 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 34 

Brad Huther, Senior Advisor for Intellectual Property Enforcement, U.S. 

Chamber of Commerce ......................................................................................... 15 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 55 

Tim Demarais, Vice President, ABRO Industries ................................................. 17 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 57 

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(1) 

PIRATING THE AMERICAN DREAM: INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY THEFT’S IMPACT ON 

AMERICA’S PLACE IN THE GLOBAL ECONOMY AND STRATEGIES FOR IMPROVING ENFORCEMENT 

THURSDAY, APRIL 12, 2007 

U.S. SENATE, SUBCOMMITTEE ON SECURITY AND INTERNATIONAL TRADE

AND FINANCE, COMMITTEE ON BANKING, HOUSING, AND URBAN AFFAIRS, Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met at 2:06 p.m., in room SD–538, Dirksen 

Senate Office Building, Senator Evan Bayh (Chairman of the Subcommittee) presiding. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN EVAN BAYH 

Senator BAYH. I am pleased to call the meeting of this subcommittee to order, and I want to thank everyone for your attendance today. I know there are a lot of other important issues, and 

we will get right to our panelists after brief opening statements by 

members of the committee. 

I would like to begin by thanking my colleagues for being with 

me here today. Senator Martinez, I look forward to working with 

you to have a vigorous agenda for our subcommittee, and I know 

that it will be a collegial undertaking because we worked well together in the past on many, many issues. 

Sherrod, you and I have known each other since the days of our 

youth, being Secretaries of State together way back when, so it will 

be pleasure working with you on these issues as well, particularly 

since we come from neighboring states. 

George, I am going to be introducing you in a moment. We consider your opinion to be so important, you are a panel of one. And 

you have had experience as a mayor, as a Governor, in addition to 

being in the U.S. Senate, so your perspective on these issues is 

greatly valued. 

I am going to be introducing the members of the second panel 

when Senator Voinovich is done with his testimony. 

Just a few brief words of my own. I would like to begin thanking 

two additional colleagues who are not with us today, that is Senator Leahy and Senator Specter, the Chairman and Ranking Member of the Judiciary Committee. This issue is one of those issues 

where there is overlapping interest between the two committees, 

and I want to express my personal appreciation to Senator Leahy 

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and Senator Specter for facilitating our hearing today. I know they 

are keenly interested in this topic, and will be taking it up in short 

order. 

They currently have a very busy agenda on the Judiciary Committee with the Attorney General’s testimony coming up here 

shortly, some of the resignations in the Justice Department. It is 

a full schedule for them, so I appreciate them letting us take the 

lead here today. 

Obviously, legislation in this area will be addressed in the Judiciary Committee. Today, we are looking to flesh out the information 

necessary to allow legislation to move forward, so I want to thank 

the members of the Judiciary Committee for that. 

This is a matter of significant urgency and importance for our 

country. Intellectual property theft is substantial and a growing 

problem, and while we have taken some good steps, particularly 

the STOP Initiative and the recently filed filing before the WTO, 

more needs to be done, if we are going to make a permanent dent 

in this problem. The estimates are that U.S. businesses lose $250 billion annually 

because of intellectual property theft. These are resources that 

could be going to profits, to wages, to investment, and obviously in 

taxes to our government to meet the costs of Social Security, Medicare, and other pressing priorities. The estimates are that we have 

lost over 750,000 jobs in the United States because of intellectual 

property theft. Clearly, this is a significant hindrance to employment growth. Ten percent of all pharmaceuticals worldwide are estimated to be fake pharmaceuticals, with obvious health consequences potentially there. 

I have seen articles that indicate that up to 90 percent of business software in China is pirated. Fifty percent of business software in India may be pirated, as well. Airline parts, auto parts, 

and a variety of other sectors in our economy suffer because of this, 

and obviously the recent WTO filing targeted music, films, and 

other parts of the entertainment industry. 

The Administration has taken some important good first steps, 

as I just mentioned, but there are some inherent limitations to 

these steps, so we need to continue the progress. For example, the 

WTO filing is good, but it addresses only 4 percent of the problem, 

and the WTO process itself can take years to reach fruition. 

We also need to make sure that this will be the beginning of a 

sustained effort. It has taken us some years to get to the point 

where we are finally taking some serious steps. I personally hope 

that these steps are not in an attempt to gather support for fasttrack legislation or the Korea Trade Initiative, but, instead, to 

show a new embrace of vigorous efforts to crack down on intellectual property theft. 

This is also important to our Nation’s security. I will just touch 

upon this briefly. I serve on the Intelligence Committee and the 

Armed Services Committee. Along with Senator Martinez, we take 

up these issues on a regular basis. We seized an Al Qaeda manual—I think it was in Afghanistan—some time ago, which recommended the sale of counterfeit goods as a possible source of financing for that organization. There were $1.2 million of fake auto 

parts seized in Lebanon not long ago. The proceeds from those 

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sales were destined for Hezbollah. North Korea engages in illicit 

sales of faked goods. There were reports in U.S. News and World 

Report at the time of the first World Trade Center attack, that that 

attack could quite possibly have been financed by the sale of counterfeit goods. 

So, if we are serious about our Nation’s security, we also need 

to be serious about cutting off the funds for those who seek to harm 

us; all too frequently that involves the theft of intellectual property. 

Finally, let me say that the support for the global trading system 

is at stake in this debate. This goes right to the heart of America’s 

comparative advantage in the economy of tomorrow. If we invest in 

innovation, in educating our population, in investing in research 

and development to create new goods, new services, new cures, and 

that innovation is stolen from us because intellectual property theft 

takes place, the global economy will not work well. It is not a sustainable model, for when our trading partners have a comparative 

advantage, we buy from them; but when we have a comparative advantage, they steel from us. That just will not last. 

So, I hope that it is possible to be for global trade, but also to 

be serious for enforcing the rules of global trade, particularly the 

protections of intellectual property. Our businesses, our workers, 

and our taxpayers have a right to expect our government to take 

vigorous action in the face of such a serious problem, and that is 

what has brought us here today. 

Senator Martinez, I would be pleased to turn to you for your 

opening comments. 

STATEMENT OF SENATOR MEL MARTINEZ 

Senator MARTINEZ. Mr. Chairman, thank you very, very much, 

and I also want to let you know how much I am looking forward 

to working with you on this subcommittee and doing a lot of good 

work in the months ahead. 

You have called this very timely hearing. It is a problem that obviously impacts American competitiveness, and it is, as you have 

highlighted in your remarks, something that all of us ought to be 

very rightly concerned. And while we have done some things, our 

government still needs to do much, much more. 

It comes very timely for me because just last week I was visiting 

in California, and I had an opportunity to see folks in the entertainment industry, and it is staggering to hear the losses of their 

sustaining as a result of pirated goods; and not only in their medium, which cannot only be done by stamping out a CD or DVD, 

but also through the Internet, which is almost seamless and invisible. And the losses are, indeed, staggering and having the impact 

of costing American jobs. 

So, whether on the issue of airline safety because of airplane 

parts or whether the medical goods that our folks are receiving are, 

in fact, what they think they are getting or what their prescriptions are calling for, it is an issue, as you indicated, of competitiveness, and also our edge in the global marketplace which oftentimes 

is defined by ingenuity and innovation. So, I think all of those lead 

to a multi-billion dollar industry that is, in fact, occurring under 

our very noses and one in which I think we need to do more. 

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Congress and the Administration have taken strong steps toward 

combating intellectual property theft, but we have not done 

enough. Since the 1990’s, global trade in counterfeits has grown 

eight times and even faster than legitimate trade. We need to increase our resources for the departments to fight this problem, and 

look for ways that we can increase penalties for the counterfeits 

and pirates, and better coordinate with international IP protection 

organizations. 

So, I am pleased to be joined here today by our distinguished 

panel of witnesses, and most of all I want to welcome our dear colleague, Senator Voinovich, and I look forward to hearing from you, 

sir. 

So, thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this hearing, and I look forward to, as I said, working with you not only on this issue on the 

many others we will tackle in the coming months. Thank you. 

Senator BAYH. Thank you, Senator Martinez. 

Senator Brown. 

STATEMENT OF SENATOR SHERROD BROWN 

Senator BROWN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for the 

work that you do on intellectual property. Senator Bayh and I sat 

in his office maybe a month ago talking about these issues, and I 

appreciate all of his contribution on this. And Senator Voinovich, 

both as Governor and as Ohio’s senior Senator, has worked hard 

especially on manufacturing issues and what it means to our state 

and exports and all of that, so thank you, George, for that work. 

In the earliest days of our Nation, we sent the marines to the 

shores of Tripoli to combat piracy against American goods. The 

Barbary pirates are long gone, but the losses we suffer today are 

just as real as those at the dawn of the 19th Century. 

Since the early 1990’s, trade in counterfeits has grown, it is believed, at eight times the rate of legitimate trade and now comprises up to 9 percent of world trade. The largest violators are 

China and Russia. According to the International Intellectual Property Alliance, in 2005, China copyright violations accounted for 

$2.6 billion. Russia violations accounted for $1.9 billion in U.S. 

trade losses. Further, IPR violations from Chinese firms alone cost 

American companies up to $24 billion a year in lost revenues. 

Fake products compose 15 to 20 percent of all products made in 

China. Intellectual property rights have, frankly, been a foreign 

concept in the People’s Republic of China. For decades, under communism, private property was banned; and for centuries before 

that, all ideas were owned by the state. Instead of innovation, the 

Chinese economic development strategy has largely relied on duplication. Just yesterday, The Washington Post reported on entire cities and towns being developed in China’s major cities that strive 

to be full replicas of U.S. and European cities. Chinese motorists 

drive ‘‘Chery’’ cars that bear a striking similarity to Chevy cars to 

towns such as ‘‘Thames Town’’ outside of Shanghai. Reports suggest that U.S. auto parts producers, a lot of them in Indiana and 

Ohio and Pennsylvania, a key industry for much of our country, are 

losing up to $9 billion each year due to Chinese fakes. 

So, how do we properly address this problem? In 1999, Congress 

sought to create a coordinated program within the Administration 

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to effectively counter the production and the importation of fake 

products. Unfortunately, the Administration has not held up its responsibilities in effectively enforcing IPR violations, as indicated by 

the ever-increasing volume of products that violate U.S. patents, 

copyrights, and trademarks over the past several years. The IPR 

Enforcement Act will work to stop the flood of fake imports into the 

U.S. through a comprehensive coordinated strategy in two important ways: First, the bill requires the Administration coordinate 

the efforts among the myriad of agencies engaged in stopping IPR 

violations under White House leadership. This legislation requires 

that agencies share the information and establish formal processes 

for cooperation and coordination at the state and local levels. 

Second, the bill requires the Administration be held accountable 

by submitting to Congress a strategic plan that develops clear and 

comprehensive action by the Administration. 

We no longer must combat a fleet of pirates off the north coast 

of Africa, but the economic damage from piracy is even greater 

today. We must show every bit as much resolve in protecting American interests, and this legislation is a good first step. I hope after 

this we will put forward the same dedication on dealing with currency issues, with protecting of workers, protecting of the environment, as we do of protecting intellectual property. All of them are 

very important. 

I commend Senators Bayh and Voinovich for their leadership. 

Thanks. 

Senator BAYH. Thank you, Senator Brown, for your interest in 

this issue, which I know is important for Ohio as well as Indiana 

and the rest of the country, and also for putting it in historical context for us. Very interesting. 

Senator Casey. 

STATEMENT OF SENATOR ROBERT P. CASEY 

Senator CASEY. Senator Bayh, thank you very much, and thank 

you for your leadership; and Senator Martinez, Senator Brown, 

and, of course, Senator Voinovich, we would like to see our colleagues as witnesses once in a while. I had the opportunity just 

once this year to introduce Governor Randell in a transportation 

hearing, and I did not realize what it was like to be on the other 

side of that table here, so we are happy to see you here. 

I do not need to reiterate some of the points that have already 

been made. This is a critically important problem for the world, but 

especially for the American economy. Obviously, I represent the 

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, a tremendous job impact that this 

has in a very adverse way. 

One statistic which may have already been cited but it bears repeating, just in terms of that one issue, that one concern about 

jobs, an estimated 750,000 American jobs are lost due to counterfeit merchandise, and that brief half a sentence tells it all. So, I 

think it is a critically important issue for our country, and I appreciate Senator Bayh making this an issue, as well as other members 

of this subcommittee as well the full committee; and, Senator Bayh, 

I wanted to thank you for that leadership, but I also want to make 

sure I am going to strongly support your bill. Is it 522? 

Senator BAYH. That is correct. 522. 

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Senator CASEY. Thank you. 

Senator BAYH. Thank you, Senator Casey. It has been my privilege now to work with two generations of the Casey family, and 

look forward to addressing this and many other pressing issues 

with you. 

Senator Voinovich, thank you for your time. It has been a privilege to work with you for many, many years, and I think your presence here before this panel and our cooperation on this initiative 

shows this is not a partisan issue. Something the democrats and 

republicans can work well on together. I hope that we can work 

well with the Administration on this, as well. It is something that 

affects businesses, workers, and I salute your making this a priority, and I am grateful for your leadership, and we are looking forward to hearing from you today. Thank you. 

STATEMENT OF GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, U.S. SENATOR FROM 

THE STATE OF OHIO 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you, Senator Bayh, and members of 

the committee. I just could not help thinking about the number of 

times that I appeared before the Congress as mayor and Governor, 

and how frightened I was. 

I want you to know that I welcome this hearing because we want 

to get this bill through Congress this session, and I appreciate the 

fact that Senator Leahy and Senator Specter have been helpful to 

us on it. It is very important that we get their support for this legislation. I think that it also does one other thing, and that is to 

bring to the public’s attention the importance of this subject, and 

many of you have already spoken eloquently to the negative impact 

that our not enforcing intellectual property rights has had on our 

Nation. 

I am proud that, as Governor, my administration gave high priority to manufacturing, and it grew during my time as Governor. 

And Senator Brown, that is one of the things that I was proud of: 

Fining manufacturing group. I worked with Ohio companies to conduct nine Ohio business trade and investment missions which were 

designed to open global markets for Ohio products. These trips 

span the globe and led to over 275 meetings between businesses 

and foreign government officials, and these trade missions resulted 

in tremendous success for Ohio business. Between 1991 and 1996, 

Ohio’s export of manufacturing goods increased 46 percent; and, 

during that time, I am proud to say that it was big and small manufacturers that participated in that growth of export. 

Since I arrived in the Senate, I have continued to fight for Ohio 

manufacturers. Unfortunately, I found that participation in the 

global economy has a dark underside: The theft of intellectual property and piracy of goods. After I arrived in the Senate, I began to 

hear from some of the same Ohio companies that joined the economic trade missions when I was Governor. These companies were 

facing a serious and growing theft: The theft of their intellectual 

property and competition from pirated products. As a matter of 

fact, one of the companies that I brought to China in 1995 did very 

well, got ripped off, and contacted me and said, ‘‘You know, what 

can you do to help me?’’ 

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As a result of these complaints, I held six oversight hearings 

about trade and intellectual property in the Homeland Security 

and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on the Oversight of Government Management. Too often during these hearings I heard the 

same story: U.S. companies would sell their products overseas, 

often working with a local partner; and, soon after, the partner or 

some other IP thief would counterfeit and start to sell the very 

goods that the U.S. companies had worked to export. Most disturbing to me was the fact that when I first started to conduct 

hearings into this problem, the response from our own government 

was almost nonexistent. During this time, I continued to express 

my concerns to the Administration, first the Secretary of Commerce 

Evans and USTR Bob Zoellick, and more recently to my good friend 

Rob Portman when he was with the USTR, as well as Secretaries 

Coteras and Paulson. 

My message was simple: Our government was not doing enough 

to address this problem, and it was failing to address companies 

that were subject to this theft. 

I was not content just to voice my complaints. I voted against 

two separate free trade bills. And I am a free trader, but I voted 

against two free trade bills to get the Administration’s attention to 

focus on the problem of intellectual property theft. 

Finally, in 2004, President Bush established the Strategic Targeted Organized Piracy Initiative, the STOP Initiative. And while 

I thought that was a good first step, I also believed these efforts 

needed an orchestra leader, someone who wakes up in the morning 

and goes to bed late at night thinking about how to improve IP protection and enforcement. I was pleased that in July of 2005 the 

President appointed Chris Israel to serve as the first U.S. coordinator for intellectual property enforcement. While I believe these 

efforts started to pay dividends, they have, from what I understand 

from people in Ohio and around the country—and I commend the 

President for taking the initiative to improve the response—the 

next step is for Congress to enact legislation to improve on this 

work, make it permanent, and give Congress an appropriate oversight role. 

What I am basically saying is, they worked real hard, they put 

something in place, and I think we ought to put it into the concrete 

and do it legislatively. 

That is why during the 109th I partnered with the Chairman of 

this Subcommittee, who also recognized the devastation this problem is having on U.S. manufacturing, and we introduced the Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Act. Because we did not get 

the legislation passed in the 109th, this past February we reintroduced it again. This legislation would improve our existing enforcement efforts: No. 1, providing better domestic enforcement coordination; two, strengthening international enforcement by reaching 

out to like-minded countries and improving coordination with these 

countries. We just cannot do this by ourselves. We need to have the 

same kind of reach-out that we have in intelligence in terms of intellectual property rights. And three, improving Congress oversight 

for requiring the development of a governmentwide IP strategic 

plan and annual reports to Congress on how these efforts are 

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faring; and, fourth, requiring the IP coordinator to work with IP 

stakeholders to develop resources to address their needs. 

Just as important, this legislation keeps the next administration 

from reinventing the wheel in January 2009. In Washington, we all 

know we come up with new ideas, and just as all the pieces are 

put in place, we have a shift in power and we lose our momentum, 

and I do not want to lose the momentum we have gained on the 

STOP Initiative. Rather, I want to continue and improve on it. Our 

democratic system is another thing that a lot of our competitors do 

not have to worry about, and that is something we fail to realize. 

Now, you wonder sometimes, are we really organized today in the 

Senate, House, the Administration, to deal with this global competition that we are experiencing? Countries like China, sadly, do 

not have congressional elections every 2 years and Presidential 

elections every 4 years. They do not have to worry with losing their 

momentum because, when the regime comes to power, it stays in 

power. Stays in power. 

Well, I was disappointed we were not able to get this passed in 

the 109th. Senator Bayh and I continued to work with business, industry groups, and labor groups to enact it. I have also, as I mentioned, spoken to Senator Leahy and Senator Specter, and I understand that the Judiciary Committee will hold hearings on a number of IP items, including this legislation. I look forward to working 

with the members of the Judiciary Committee on this legislation, 

and I appreciate the willingness of the Chair and Ranking Member 

to examine this important issue. I would note that since we reintroduced this legislation, over 30 organizations have endorsed it, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the AFL–CIO, National 

Association of Manufacturers, and United Auto Workers. 

Now, let me just say this: With the kind of support we have here 

in this room, there is not any reason why we cannot get this done 

on a bipartisan basis in this Congress. It is long overdue. The last 

bastion that we may have to be competitive in that global market 

place is our new ideas; and if they could steal our ideas, then we 

are in very big trouble. 

So, I think this is important to our national security, I think it 

is important to our global competitiveness, and I really appreciate 

the fact that you have given me a chance to share my thoughts 

with you this afternoon. Thank you. 

Senator BAYH. Senator, thank you for your long-standing devotion to this issue and for really being one of the moving factors behind the creation of the STOP Initiative. As I understand it—I will 

ask my colleagues if there are any questions, but as I understand 

your testimony, you think this needs to be a major national priority, you think that it needs to be coordinated across the branches 

of government, you think it needs to be a global response, and it 

must be permanent? 

Senator VOINOVICH. Yes, I do, absolutely, and I am hopeful that 

the Administration understands how important it is to our country. 

I mean, they have done a halfway decent job on this, and now they 

have a chance to make it permanent and move forward. 

And again, I hope the folks that are sitting behind me will make 

it very clear to the Administration how important it is to their respective organizations that this gets done now. 

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Senator BAYH. Well, I agree. 

Are there questions? Senator Martinez. 

Senator MARTINEZ. Senator, I was going to ask you, I know that 

permanence is one of the issues, but is there a different enforcement mechanism that the STOP Act would do different from what 

is being done now, or is it mostly the fact that it would be established and permanent? 

Senator VOINOVICH. There are two things—the STOP Act does 

not have the international dimension, even though Chris Israel is 

traveling around, it does not. He is kind of doing it on his own. But 

there is nothing in the legislation that says we ought to be reaching out with other countries in the area of IPR enforcement. 

Second, this legislation provides that, in the Office of Budget and 

Management, you have got somebody there that is going to look 

over how this is all working out, because the problem today with 

Chris is that he is, like, the coordinator of some lower-level people. 

And I mentioned this morning to OMB Director Portman, that you 

need somebody at OMB to sort of be there, and someone says, ‘‘You 

know, this is not working,’’ and agencies know that somebody that 

is over them can stay on them. It is very much like what I did. I 

had regional representatives when I was Governor, and they were 

supposed to get stuff done out in the state, and all of the agencies 

of state government were supposed to cooperate with them. Well, 

what I did was I had those regional reps send me a weekly report, 

so every week I read what was going on. The agency directors 

knew I was reading those reports, and they knew that if they were 

not cooperating they would hear from me, and I think that is the 

kind of oversight that we need if we are going to get serious about 

this enforcement. 

Senator MARTINEZ. That is all, thank you. 

Senator BAYH. One of our witnesses on the next panel from the 

GAO will explain how the STOP Initiative has been good, but from 

an ongoing perspective there are improvements in the structure 

that could make it more either more effective in terms of setting 

goals and identifying resources necessary for achieving them and 

holding people accountable for following through. 

You were sounding more like a former executive, George. It was 

refreshing to hear. 

Senator Casey. 

Senator CASEY. Two quick comments. 

Senator, thank you for your testimony, and especially the sense 

of urgency that you bring to this issue. That is always a challenge, 

it seems, in Washington, and I appreciate the intensity of your 

focus on this in the long years of work you put into it. 

And second, for mentioning my Pennsylvania colleague, Senator 

Specter, in his work on Judiciary, along with Senator Leahy and 

others, as part of this team effort to get this job done, but thank 

you again. 

Senator VOINOVICH. Thank you. 

Senator BAYH. I would like to ask the members of the second 

panel to please come forward and take your seats. 

While you are doing so, let me say that I would be remiss if I 

also did not thank our colleague, Senator Dodd, the Chairman of 

the full Banking Committee, for facilitating the hearing today. I am 

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10 

very grateful for his leadership. He cares deeply about this issue, 

and I want to publicly express my gratitude to Senator Dodd. 

Gentlemen, thank you very much. I am going to ask for your 

help. If I get the pronunciations of any name slightly wrong, do not 

hesitate to correct me. 

What we would like to do, if it is appropriate, after the introductions—Moise ́s, I think we will begin with you and then go to Dr. 

Yager and then Brad Huther, and then finally Tim Demarais, if 

that order is appropriate. 

Your full statements will be submitted for the record. If we could 

try to keep it close to 5 minutes, that will be ideal; of course, members of the committee will try to do the same. But if you run a little 

bit over it, that will be OK. If you keep it in the ballpark, that 

would be good. 

Our first panelist today, Moise ́s Naı ́m—did I get that correct? 

Mr. NAI ́M. Yes. 

Senator BAYH [continuing]. Is the editor and publisher of Foreign 

Policy magazine, a leading publication on international politics and 

economics. He has written extensively on the political economy of 

international trade and investment, multinational organizations, 

economic reforms, and globalization. He is the author and editor of 

several books and has written numerous essays and articles. His 

regular opinion columns appear in The Financial Times and are 

also carried by many of the world’s leading newspapers. Naı ́m is 

one of the six members of Time magazine’s international board of 

economists. Moise ́s, thank you for joining us today. 

I will make the other introductions, and we will begin with the 

statements. 

Also with us today is Dr. Loren Yager. Dr. Yager is currently 

serving as Director of the International Affairs and Trade Team of 

the U.S. Government Accounting Office (GAO), where he is responsible for international trade and related issues. Dr. Yager has recently completed reports and congressional testimony on topics including China import remedies, global corporate/social responsibility, global intellectual property protection, offshoring of U.S. 

services, terrorist financing, the World Trade Organization, Conflict Diamonds, China’s WTO compliance, the Maquiladora industry, container security, and a variety of other subjects—you have 

been a busy man, Dr. Yager—particularly in the subject that gathers us here today. I want to thank you and your staff for your very 

thoughtful work. It was very analytical and very detailed, so I am 

grateful for your sharing the thoughts that you and your staff have 

here with us today. 

Also with us is Mr. Brad Huther. Thank you for joining us today. 

Mr. Huther coordinates the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Intellectual Property Enforcement Program. The Chamber is a business 

federation representing 3 million companies, associations, state and 

local Chambers and American Chambers of Commerce abroad. Mr. 

Huther joined the Chamber in January 2005 to advance its fight 

against counterfeiting and piracy. His commitment to strengthening intellectual property systems worldwide is evident through 

his work as President and CEO of the International Intellectual 

Property Institute, Special Attach’ at the World Intellectual Property Organization in Geneva, and Associate Commissioner of the 

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U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Mr. Huther, I would like to 

thank you and the Chamber for your presence today. 

Just as Senator Voinovich’s presence and Senator Martinez’s 

presence demonstrates that this is a bipartisan undertaking. The 

Chamber’s interest in this, along with the AFL-CIO, the United 

Auto Workers and others shows that this can unite management 

as well as labor, and I would particularly like to thank you for your 

cooperative approach toward complementing those steps that have 

been taken thus far, but also looking to how we could improve and 

buildupon what has been done. So, I want to thank you for the 

spirit you have brought to this dialog. 

Last, but by no means least, we have Timothy Demarais, Vice 

President of ABRO Industries, Inc. It is good to have a fellow hoosier with us here, adding some additional midwest common sense 

to the dialog this morning, and also to help us put a human face 

on this problem. Tim has spent 33 years with ABRO Industries. 

Based in South Bend, Indiana, ABRO sells adhesives and other 

products. As Vice President of International Sales and Marketing, 

Mr. Demarais developed the ABRO brand concept which has spearheaded company growth from $4 million in sales in 1974 to a projected $100 million in 2007. Mr. Demarais has made more than 100 

overseas business trips since joining the firm, doing business in 

over 150 countries. He helped ABRO achieve the President’s ‘‘E’’ 

Award in 1991 and the President’s ‘‘E’’ Star Award in 2005. He was 

featured with ABRO’s company President in the Wall Street Journal for a 2004 cover story on combating counterfeiting in China. 

Demarais personally led raids on foreign firms that were illegally 

importing fake ABRO products, resulting in the seizure and destruction of thousands of cartons of counterfeit merchandise. He received his BBA in marketing from the University of Notre Dame. 

During his junior year, he studied international business at Sophia 

University Tokyo. Tim, we look forward to hearing from you again 

today. 

Dr. Naı ́m, let us begin with you. 

STATEMENT OF MOISE ́ S NAI ́M, EDITOR IN CHIEF, 

FOREIGN POLICY MAGAZINE 

Mr. NAI ́M. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for giving me the opportunity to be before you today. Before entering into the details of my 

presentation of my testimony, I want to recognize you and your 

leadership, Mr. Chairman, in battling the problems created by the 

booming global trade in counterfeits as well as your sincere interest 

in seeking innovative solutions to contain this growing threat, having followed your efforts and those of Senator Voinovich and other 

members of the committee for years in trying to untangle or understand and find innovative and interesting ways of dealing with 

this. 

Today, I will make five brief points concerning the international 

trade in stolen intellectual property, and I will conclude the remarks with a proposal for your consideration. 

First, the international trade in counterfeited goods is just one 

of many illicit trades that has recently boomed. It is very important 

to understand that the trade in counterfeits is just one segment of 

a booming black economy that, thanks to globalization and some 

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other changes that took place in the nineties, have acquired unprecedented scope and consequences for the global economy, and it 

is undermining institutions and politics everywhere in the world. 

The illegal international trade in people, narcotics, timber, industrial waste, human organs, weapons of mass destruction, and myriad other goods is booming, as I said, and there are many interesting similarities among all these traits. Smuggling luxury products from Asia to Europe may look very different than smuggling 

cocaine from the Andes to Florida or illegal workers to Spain or 

small arms to Africa. 

Yet, the economic forces, organizational arrangements, and business models driving these trades, as well as the behavior of the 

players involved, are strikingly similar. They are not the same people or the same criminal networks, but the forces that drive them 

and the way they are organized and operate, they are much in common. Government responses have also been quite similar, and unfortunately in all cases their success has proven very elusive. There 

is hardly any country that can claim major progress in containing 

the growth of any of these illicit trades. Therefore, a major implication of this first point is that there is much that can be learned 

from past and current efforts aimed at curbing illicit traffic, trafficking in other markets and products. 

In some cases, these traffics are connected. The vendor that sells 

you a fake luxury bag in the streets in Manhattan or a few blocks 

from here is often as illicit as the bag itself. The network that traffics in counterfeits are connected to the networks of trafficking in 

illegal workers, and those in turn are connected to the networks 

that specialize in money laundering. 

My second point is that a common mistake that I have found in 

legislation aimed at controlling illicit trades everywhere is that too 

often it assumes that governments are more capable and effective 

than what has proven to be the case. There are many reasons for 

this performance gap, but the most important is that governments 

are very constrained when they have to operate outside their national jurisdiction. The natural habitat of a government is inside a 

nation’s borders; instead, the national habitat of traffickers is in 

between national borders. 

While traffickers are perfectly at home when operating illegally 

across borders, governments are slowed down, indeed often paralyzed when having to operate internationally. This means that in 

order to be effective in battling international smuggling rings, government needs to be selective in what it tries to achieve. It is unrealistic to expect government to combat every aspect of counterfeiting. Therefore, selectivity and modesty in the choice of goals assigned to government agencies should be a crucial test of any legislation in this area. 

The third point is that another frequent characteristic of 

antitrafficking campaigns worldwide is that they all tend to concentrate more on constraining the supply of the smuggled goods 

that are limiting their demands. This fact is well-known in the case 

on the War on Drugs in the United States or what happens with 

illegal workers. 

It is important to remember that the boom in pirated goods owes 

as much to a growing demand as it does to growing supply, where 

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talking literally about billions of consumers around the world who 

are willing—indeed, eager—to bogus facsimiles of products at a 

fraction of the price of the original lawful goods. This market of 

consumers is served by millions of some of the most innovative, 

ruthless, and managerially and technologically sophisticated entrepreneurs at work today in the global economy. 

This is a powerful market and is driven more by high profits 

than by low morals, by demand as well as by supply. Thus, approaching this fight purely from a law enforcement or legalistic 

perspective aimed at curbing the supply will miss the fact that we 

are in the presence of a gigantic market with millions of buyers 

and sellers and immense volumes of merchandise and money 

changing hands. 

My fourth point is simple and brief, and you have already noted, 

and it is in the legislation, and that is that no country can successfully tackle this problem acting alone. A global problem cannot be 

solved with unilateral national efforts containing the growth of the 

global counterfeiting market inevitably requires the effective coordination of several nations acting in concert. 

My final point is that patents, copyrights, trademarks and other 

legal instruments are increasingly failing to protect the rights of 

owners of intellectual property. Brands, designs, formal software 

and content with commercial value are being routinely stolen, copied, and sold worldwide at a fraction of the price charged by the 

original owners. Entire industries have been devastated by piracy. 

It is apparent that the ability of governments to enforce intellectual property rights is rapidly declining. The governments are not 

being able to stop this. Moreover, there are good reasons to assume 

this decline cannot be stopped, reversed, or even slowed down in 

the short term. The implication of this point is not that governments have to abandon the fight to ensure intellectual property 

rights are protected and enforced at home and abroad, but other 

governments should not be held accountable for their complacency 

and often their complicity with the counterfeiting industry. 

Rather, the implication is that governments need to be supported 

in their efforts to combat this illicit trade by the most intensive use 

possible of anticopying technologies. There is much that technology 

can do and is already doing to safeguard products from illegal copy. 

I, therefore, believe that it is very promising market-based solution 

is to include in any legislation mechanisms that will stimulate and 

accelerate the development and adoption of new technology by the 

business sector. These technologies will make counterfeiting products far more difficult than what they are now to copy. 

I am convinced that, in the foreseeable future, technology, not 

patents, sanctions or other traditional means for fighting intellectual property theft will become critical in protecting the intellectual 

property of innovators, creators, and artists. 

Thank you again, Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, for affording me this opportunity to testify before you. 

Senator BAYH. Thank you, Dr. Naı ́m. 

Dr. Yager. 

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STATEMENT OF LOREN YAGER, DIRECTOR OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS AND TRADE, GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE 

Mr. YAGER. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Martinez, thank 

you for the opportunity to appear before this subcommittee to discuss our work on U.S. efforts to protect U.S. intellectual property 

rights. We appreciate the opportunity to contribute to the congressional oversight of IP protection both in this hearing as well as in 

another report on the subject for Senator Voinovich that will be released shortly. 

IP protection and enforcement cut across a wide range of U.S. 

agencies and functions, making coordination among all parties essential and creating an important oversight role for the Congress. 

In my statement today, I will address two topics on IP enforcement: First, the effectiveness of the current coordinating structure 

to guide and manage U.S. Government efforts; and second, the extent to which current efforts incorporate important features of an 

effective national strategy. 

Mr. Chairman, my statement today will also include some observations on how the Bayh-Voinovich legislation addresses key weaknesses that we have identified in our work on IP enforcement. To 

address these issue, I have drawn on a number of completed GAO 

studies, and these studies are identified in my written statement. 

Mr. Chairman, to discuss the current interagency coordination 

structure on IP, you have to understand two key components. The 

first component is what is called ‘‘NIPLECC,’’ the National Intellectual Property Law Enforcement Coordination Council. Created by 

the Congress in 1999 to serve as the central coordinating structure 

for IP enforcement across Federal agencies, NIPLECC has struggled to define its purpose, retains an image of inactivity within the 

private sector, and continues to have leadership problems, despite 

enhancements made by Congress in December 2004 to strengthen 

its role. 

The second component is the 2004 Presidential initiative called 

‘‘STOP,’’ the Strategy to Target Organized Piracy, which is led by 

the National Security Council. Many agency officials said that 

STOP has increased attention to IP issues within their agency in 

the private sector as well as abroad, and attribute that to the fact 

that STOP came out of the White House, thereby lending it more 

authority and influence. 

To summarize our key findings, we raised two questions about 

this combination of NIPLECC and STOP to ensure IP protection, 

and I could term these two as accountability and long-term viability. Both of these issues were mentioned in the opening statements 

as well as in Senator Voinovich’s statement. 

In terms of accountability, we found that STOP’s potential is limited because it does not fully address valuable characteristics of an 

effective national strategy. For example, its performance measures 

lack baselines and targets to assess how well the activities are 

being implemented. In addition, the strategy lacks a risk-management framework in a discussion of current or future costs, important elements to effectively balance the threats from counterfeit 

products with the resources available. 

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Although STOP identifies organizational roles and responsibilities with respect to individual agency’s STOP activities, it does not 

specify who will provide oversight and accountability among the 

agencies who are carrying out the strategy. This lack-of-accountability features limit the strategy’s usefulness as a management 

tool for effective oversight by Congress as well as accountability to 

the private sector and to consumers who STOP aims to protect. 

In terms of long-term viability, we point out that STOP has no 

permanence as a Presidential initiative and, therefore, no guarantee that it will exist after the end of this Administration. While 

the most recent annual report describes many STOP activities, it 

does not explain how NIPLECC principals plan to carry out the responsibilities mandated by the Congress. From the beginning of 

NIPLECC, Congress’s goal has been to institutionalize law enforcement coordination, and our work suggests that this goal has not 

yet been met. 

In GAO’s recent report on this subject, we included recommendations to address these issues of accountability and long-term viability. Our discussions with the IP coordinator, in preparation for this 

testimony, indicated that NIPLECC has taken some steps to address GAO’s recommendations, such as working with OMB to understand government priorities and resources related to IP enforcement. 

Mr. Chairman, I would note that the Bayh-Voinovich legislation 

proposes more fundamental changes to the current coordinating 

structure. For example, by creating IPEN, it eliminates the need 

for NIPLECC and resolves the lack of permanence that is of concern with the STOP Initiative. In addition, the legislation requires 

the new coordinating structure to prepare a plan that addresses 

key elements of an effective strategy, building in mechanisms for 

accountability, oversight, and strengthening leadership. These 

changes are consistent with the key findings of our report. 

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my statement. I would be happy 

to answer any questions that you have. 

Senator BAYH. Dr. Yager, thank you very, very much. 

Mr. Huther. 

STATEMENT OF BRAD HUTHER, SENIOR ADVISOR FOR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY ENFORCEMENT, U.S. CHAMBER OF 

COMMERCE 

Mr. HUTHER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I am sorry 

Senator Martinez left the room, but I wanted to commend him as 

well as you—— 

Senator BAYH. Nothing personal, Mr. Huther. He said he will be 

back in a couple of minutes. 

Mr. HUTHER. Well, maybe I will say it twice, then, but he has 

been working on the Chamber on this issue since the Chamber decided to begin working on this issue, and we are especially grateful 

for his support and your leadership in bringing us to where we are 

today. 

In Washington, the phrase ‘‘public-private partnership’’ is used a 

lot, and yet I think if there is a good example of a public-private 

partnership, it could very well be the combination of what the business community is doing through a coalition against counterfeiting 

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and piracy that now numbers almost 300 trade associations and 

companies, whose commitment is to do one thing, and that is to 

work toward the development of solutions that can be transferred 

to companies everywhere, not just those of the Chamber or not just 

those of the associations and companies that are present in our 

program, because we think it is critical—it has been brought out 

earlier—that without the leveraged efforts of anyone and everyone 

who is involved in this problem, both directly and indirectly, including consumers, who sometimes are not associated with the 

problem, this problem is not going to go away. 

The features that you have included in your proposed legislation, 

we think, builds upon the solid foundation that others have already 

addressed. The work of the Administration, together with the work 

of the business coalition that the Chamber now represents shows 

good progress, but if we were to stay the course, doing what we are 

now doing, we believe we would not be able to effectively deliver 

the kind of global solution that is really necessary. 

So, your approach in terms of engaging and elevating the importance of this public policy issue, and including the involvement of 

stakeholders and foreign governments and the law enforcement 

community without impinging on their current authorities to continue to do what they have been doing before and to make decisions as they are authorized to make them, we think, is the right 

overall strategy to engage in. 

The Chamber, in its coalition, is working on facets of this program that have been addressed, including the technology issue, 

how we can deal with Internet problems, where a lot of the trade 

and illicit goods is occurring, to transferring knowledge to many of 

our small and medium enterprises that lack the resources first to 

even protect their supply chain, if they know they have got a problem with it; or, second, to protect their intellectual property rights, 

if they file for patent or trademark or copyright protection in foreign locations. It is an expensive undertaking, and no one is capable of doing this alone. 

So, therefore, the framework that you are establishing, in my 

opinion, and in the Chamber’s opinion, is building on the best 

premise: Let’s keep the best parts of what we have learned through 

STOP, let’s continue to engage the business community because we 

are not only knocking on government’s door or asking for things to 

be done. We are pledging our resources and our expertise and our 

talent to add to that of the government. And maybe at some point 

in time when we engage other partners, as the Administration has 

already begun to do, the E.U.-U.S. framework has promise for 

doing some very important work in that region. The Security and 

Prosperity Partnership Agreement in North America, while lacking 

in E.U. and U.S. collaboration, I think, has the chance to do the 

very same thing in our part of the world. APAC and other organizations like them are doing them together. 

So, your IPEN framework starts connecting all the stars in the 

constellation at a time when I think those stars are properly 

aligned to do and leverage the work that needs to be done on a 

much grander scale than we have been able to justify to date. 

I will close by indicating that I had the privilege of testifying before then Chairman Voinovich’s subcommittee on the issues of 

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STOP and on the issues of NIPLECC. I said then, and I say now: 

I think they do very good work. I know they are because they come 

to the Chamber on average once a month to tell us what kind of 

progress they are making. 

If I had one criticism, which your bill address, I said then that 

I thought that if the Government Performance and Results Act 

Framework were invoked in this area, it would become a lot clearer 

for industry to understand where the government is going, enable 

us to understand how we might redirect some of our activities and 

resources so as to support a national strategy to deal with this, and 

linking that national strategy to an international one. 

So, again, Mr. Chairman, we thank you for your leadership on 

this issue. It is clear the Chamber supports the enactment of this 

legislation. More importantly, I think I could tell you that the 

Chamber, together with its working coalition, stands ready to help 

and contribute to the successful implementation of what we think 

is one of the most important public strategies that the Congress 

can undertake in the current session. So, thank you. 

Senator BAYH. Thank you very much. We are in favor of what 

works, and building upon past successes and collaborating going 

forward to improve the effectiveness of this effort, and you and 

your organization have been very instrumental on that, so once 

again I want to thank you for your contribution, both past and future. 

Mr. Demarais, our representative from the real world. We are 

looking forward to hearing from you. 

STATEMENT OF TIM DEMARAIS, VICE PRESIDENT, 

ABRO INDUSTRIES 

Mr. DEMARAIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for giving me the opportunity to testify regarding one of America’s most contentious 

foreign trade issues: The theft of intellectual property worldwide. 

I spent my entire career—33 years—working overseas combating 

legitimate competition. Just the last few years I realize there is 

something else out there that is not equal playing field, and hopefully today we try to balance that playing field. 

I feel ABRO is one of the most unique, one of the most innovative 

trading companies in the United States. We are known as the buccaneers of the trading world from what we have done in the past. 

We initially concentrated on selling ABRO products in Third World 

markets, and there is no place we would not travel to introduce our 

ABRO brand. We visited and did business in diverse markets such 

as Nigeria, Congo, Pakistan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Sierra 

Leone—just to name a few of the diverse markets. We now sell our 

ABRO products in over 150 countries. 

In time, our ABRO automotive products became the brand of 

choice in many global markets, but unfortunately today the ABRO 

name has also become the brand of choice to counterfeit by unscrupulous manufacturers worldwide. We recognized early that our 

trademark was one of our most important assets, and over the past 

28 years we have registered the ABRO trademark in 167 countries. 

So, we were doing our job. We had spent hundreds of thousands 

of dollars registering our trademark, and ironically we have spent 

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an equal amount in defending our trademark worldwide against 

importers of counterfeit ABRO products. 

Although we could point to many examples of counterfeiters overseas, one foreign company that has taken intellectual property violation to a new level is Hunan Magic Company in Hunan, China. 

We did not know we had this problem until 2001, when I received 

an E-mail from our ABRO distributor, requesting that he would 

like to buy the ABRO products from our Chinese subsidiary. I 

knew we did not have a Chinese subsidiary, and went to the Canton Trade Fair later that year and was absolutely shocked to see 

Hunan’s Magic booth, which had a full display of all of our ABRO 

products, and the company was actively selling ABRO products to 

many overseas customers, including my own. 

The company had literally stolen our corporate identity, stating 

they owned the ABRO name, which, of course, is not true. I immediately contacted the show officials and advised them that this 

company was illegally selling ABRO products. The officials agreed 

to raid the booth, and I was stunned when the general manager of 

the Chinese company produced documentation that showed they 

had the rights to the trademark in China. It actually was in a 

trademark registration. It was an application, but to them they 

took it as the official trademark. 

There was obviously uncertainty at this point, until I picked up 

a sample of our ABRO Epoxy that Hunan Magic was displaying in 

their booth and selling to my customers. Our ABRO Epoxy is a 

product that I personally developed 20 years ago. At that time, we 

were not doing a hundred million dollars. We were somewhat of a 

low-budget operation. I had taken a picture of my wife applying 

epoxy to our bicycle in our house and put this photo on a blister 

card similar to this. This product has become one of our most popular selling ABRO products with millions of units being sold annually. 

I immediately asked the general manager of Hunan Magic who 

is this lady on the ABRO Epoxy card? He told the show officials 

it was some western model. 

I reached into my wallet, pulled out on a picture of my wife 

which finally convinced the show authorities we actually own the 

trademark, and they closed down the booth, and Hunan Magic was 

cited for using the ABRO trademark illegally. 

We thought the matter was settled and we were very happy, 

until the next trade show, when Hunan Magic changed the packaging slightly by deleting the face of my wife and replacing it with 

the face of an Asian woman but keeping everything else the same, 

including the ABRO name. As you could see, they are identical. 

This story was a subject of a cover feature in the Wall Street 

Journal, and we thought the notoriety would convince the Chinese 

Government to do something by controlling this renegade Chinese 

manufacture. Unfortunately, their illegal activity has become more 

blatant, as Hunan Magic is now selling ABRO products in all our 

major markets, and the general manager has publicly stated that 

his ABRO brand is one of the most successful brands they have 

ever introduced. That is why we are thrilled that a new act is being 

introduced in the Senate by Senator Voinovich and, of course, yourself. We all know about the War on Terror that is being fought 

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globally, but in the business community we look at intellectual 

property violations as a War on Economic Terrorism. 

As these companies who are counterfeiting are stealing patents, 

trademarks, ideas, and designs from American companies. It was 

encouraging to note that recently the U.S. Government announced 

that would it ask the World Trade Organization to organize meetings to address deficiencies in China’s protection of the intellectual 

property rights on books, music, videos, and movies. However, 

there was no mention of many other U.S. products that are being 

counterfeited, including automotive parts and accessories. We only 

hope that the U.S. Government will address these deficiencies in 

all areas of intellectual property violations. 

The past 5 years have been most frustrating as ABRO’s biggest 

competitor is not STP, General Electric, or some other well-known 

automotive chemical manufacturer. Our biggest competitor has become ABRO products from China, which is clearly not how our 

American dream to ABROnize the world was expected to play out. 

We ask that the U.S. Government treat intellectual property matter more seriously and pass legislation that will correct these trade 

injustices and then provide agencies overseas the effective muscle 

to enforce the new trade legislation. 

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to testify today and 

allow me to vent some of my personal past frustrations on this 

matter. We continue to fight the battle in the overseas sales 

trenches every day, but we do need some help from the generals 

back here in Washington. The War on Economic Terrorism can be 

won, but it is going to take a concentrated effort by everyone here 

in Washington to force China and other countries who violate intellectual property to comply with their WTO obligations, which requires these economic powers to enforce intellectual property laws 

in their own country. Thank you. 

Senator BAYH. Mr. Demarais, thank you very much. We are 

happy to provide you a forum to vent your frustrations, but more 

than that we would like to provide you with action to address the 

problem that has been affecting you. And I wish I could say that 

your testimony here today was some sort of aberration, but regrettably it reflects the experience of too many American businessmen 

and women who have attempted—who have had to combat this 

kind of problem often without the kind of backup, as you say, from 

the generals in Washington that you deserve, so thank you for 

that. 

By the way, Senator Martinez, you should know Mr. Huther said 

very nice things about you in your absence. 

Senator MARTINEZ. I am sorry, I had to step out for a minute, 

I am sorry, but thank you, sir. 

Senator BAYH. We will make sure the record notes that. 

We begin some questions now. I will start, and then I will limit 

myself to 5 minutes and turn to you; and, if there are further questions, we will keep going. 

I am going to start in the order in which our witnesses testified, 

but let me just start, Moise ́s, not only for you, but other panelists, 

judging by your written testimony and oral presentations today, it 

is my impression that all of you would agree this is a growing problem, a growing phenomena. It is not contained. It is not static. It 

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is, in fact, continuing apace, unfortunately. I think, Moise ́s, you 

particularly said that there is a degree of humility in our effort to 

combat this through traditional methods, so we should take—the 

steps that have been taken have been good and positive. We need 

to build on them, but take perhaps with a grain of salt or some degree of skepticism claims by anyone that material advancements 

have been made in containing the problem. Is that a fair description? 

Mr. NAI ́M. It is, Mr. Chairman, and essentially I want to reiterate a central message, and that is that I would love to see companies like ABRO and Mr. Demarais have incentive and additional 

possibilities to use their ingenuity to try to find ways that would 

make the copying of the products more difficult. I am not suggesting that there should not be legislation and all sorts of initiatives, local and international, to protect companies like ABRO from 

the fact that the products are stolen, but it would be wonderful if 

they are given—that that same ingenuity would be stimulated to 

find ways to make it harder because, by the time we make these 

processes take place, they will continue to suffer significant losses. 

Senator BAYH. Are aware of any efforts along those lines to promote technologies that would combat—of course, in the entertainment arena, we are familiar, but perhaps a bit harder in the manufactured goods. 

I must say when you first suggested it and I read it with in your 

submitted testimony, I think it is an excellent idea, but the first 

thing that crossed my mind today when you said it and I read it 

was to wonder how long it would be before the technology intended 

to protect IP was itself stolen. 

Mr. NAI ́M. That is one aspect, and the other aspect is tat not all 

products will be amenable to be protected by physical, by protections and technology, and we have to recognize that. 

But, Mr. Huther can tell you that, in the business sector, this is 

already happening, a lot of the companies are complaining and are 

suffering, are just not waiting for legislation, are just not waiting 

for the patents. They are already taking matters in their own technological hands and investing significant amounts of money in research and development of products, processes, and technologies 

that would make copying harder. As you said, Mr. Chairman, in 

music and videos and technology and software, there is a significant push in that direction. 

All I am saying is that it will be very interesting to find ways 

to create even more incentives for these companies to do this. 

Senator BAYH. Let me ask you about, as we await the creation 

of technologies that enable us to make the kind of advancements 

we all hope to make, as you pointed out, this is a transnational 

problem that needs a multilateral response. Part of our legislative 

suggestion would be to identify countries with similar interests 

that are willing to adhere to state-of-the-art standards and try to 

build out from there. 

The Justice Department has offered a different opinion. They do 

not think that is a useful suggestion. For example, they say that 

the exclusion of China and Russia from such an effort would make 

it ineffective. What is your reaction to that? 

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Mr. NAI ́M. I tend to agree, Mr. Chairman, with the Justice Department. I think that this problem cannot be solved by excluding 

parts of the chain. And yes, China may be an epicenter of manufacturing and exports of counterfeited goods, but the United States is 

an epicenter of the distribution and purchase of these goods. So, 

there are as many violations of intellectual property taking place 

in the streets of the United States and in the United States by customers that are buying these illegal products as there are companies in China and elsewhere that are selling these products. 

So, again, as I said in my statement, this is a problem that has 

suppliers, but it also has customers, and therefore it is very important to integrate, to have an integrated view of this. 

Senator BAYH. I see my time—I have run up against the 5- 

minute limit. 

Mel, why don’t I turn to you. 

Senator MARTINEZ. Thank you, Evan. 

Mr. Naı ́m, I wanted to ask you your thoughts, and I glean from 

your testimony it is a difficult issue for governments to enforce intellectual property in their own countries, but I was wondering how 

much of it was due to the difficulty of enforcement and how much 

was just benign neglect on their part and not caring enough to do 

it and, therefore, the implications of that in terms of trade agreements we entered into and the seriousness of purpose with which 

we might be able to enforce our trade agreements. 

Mr. NAI ́M. Yes, Senator Martinez, that is a very good question, 

and I agree with you and others that have noted the importance 

of placing this issue more in the center of the legislative efforts and 

taking more initiatives, and I welcome the bill, and I think this discussion and debate is very important. 

So, there is some benign neglect, but I would just be careful and 

cautious in just chalking it down to lack of political will in some 

governments. That may be the case, but let us remember that 

there are very powerful economic interests associated with this industry, and that in many countries these interests are far more 

powerful even than governments. 

I do not know that in some countries governments can risk the 

instability and political upheaval that would create taking on what 

is essentially in many countries the biggest game in town. For 

many countries, this is the largest employment-producing, revenueproducing industry, and people that are in it are involved and very 

often part of the government, are part of the military, part of the 

judiciary. And so it is—and I understand that working with governments that are so penetrated by the traffickers poses important 

questions and dilemmas. 

All I am trying to show is the complexity of the issue and outline 

the limitations of legislative initiatives, not particularly this one, 

but to be careful not to create the illusion of solutions, but be careful and understand the limits of this activity. 

Senator MARTINEZ. I think it is very enlightening what you say, 

but also a bit frightening to think that they may be bigger than 

the governments in other countries, but I would think that in 

places like India and China, which are such huge trading partners 

of ours, would be two places where more enforcement by the government and more of an interest by the government might be helpsmartinez on DSKB9S0YB1PROD with HEARING

22 

ful, and I am not sure that would translate to every other country, 

but certainly there. 

Mr. Huther, I wonder if you might touch on, through the Chamber, what do you see business doing to assist themselves in the 

vein of what was being suggested through their own technology 

and so forth to bring about change in this arena, even before legislation. 

Mr. HUTHER. I would be delighted, Senator. The Chamber, together with its coalition, has seven active working groups, one of 

which focuses specifically on the issue of not only current technology but leading-edge or next-generation technology that could 

protect products at some various stages of the supply chain. We 

have learned from the preliminary research that old technology like 

radio frequency identifiers that have been around for 40 years or 

more, the counterfeiters and pirates have quite adroitly learned 

how to take advantage of that technology and turn it into a way 

of protecting their part of the supply chain, the illegitimate part. 

But you could find examples of holograms, you can find examples 

of watermarks, you can find examples of all different types of technology that industry has decided to try at sometimes considerable 

expense. It is not inexpensive to put something that costs a penny 

or a dime on literally millions of products that you are shipping all 

over the planet. 

I think the bottom line is we are dealing with a very sophisticated, organized element that understands that, if they could defeat the technology, they could enhance the profitability of what 

they are doing. So, they are probably investing more resources in 

finding ways to invest in the technology we are trying to employ 

and transfer the benefits of to companies all over the planet, but 

most notably the small and medium enterprises who really do not 

have a good understanding of what this kind of technology can and 

should do for them, but it is a high-risk thing. The latest technology becomes yesterday’s work-around for counterfeiters. 

Senator MARTINEZ. Mr. Chairman, I wanted to thank you for the 

hearing and, as I told you at the beginning, I am going to catch 

an airplane to meet a speaking engagement in Florida tonight, but 

I want to thank the panel before being here. And it seems to me 

that at a time when entities that are really outside governments 

and outside nations present the greatest risk to national security 

that this type of an industry that also operates really outside the 

law and outside our governmental supervision and oversight and 

regulations is the very thing that, in confluence with one another, 

can continue to fund and enhance the threat to our national security that we see from terrorism. 

So, it seems like an adjoining part of terrorism, if we think about 

it in that broader context. But thank you very much for this important hearing, and thank you. 

Senator BAYH. Have a safe trip. 

Mr. Yager, I would like to move to you, if I could, and I would 

like to get back to the Justice Department and some of the concerns they expressed about our proposed approach. Let’s start with 

the issue of stovepiping and information sharing. The Department 

seems to be under the impression that information is being adesmartinez on DSKB9S0YB1PROD with HEARING

23 

quately shared horizontally across government agencies and that 

that is not an issue. What is your opinion? 

Mr. YAGER. Chairman Bayh, we have been doing work on this 

particular subject now for a number of years, and I guess it depends on your perspective, but I think maybe their expectations are 

not in the same place as the Congress’s expectations in terms of 

information sharing. 

For example, I think the performance of NIPLECC itself is one 

that I think that the Department of Justice has generally been supportive of the way that it was set up, but unfortunately it has not 

reached or has not changed the expectations of the Congress in a 

number of ways. For example, in the budget process, the Congress 

has made a number of comments about the quality of the 

NIPLECC report, particularly before the most recent report in saying it has not met their expectations in terms of timeliness and 

quality. So, I think, from the perspective of the Congress, it has not 

met expectations. 

In addition, I think as Brad mentioned before, the private sector 

has also expressed some questions about the effectiveness of coordination in this area. 

Finally, there is another group that has been set up—it is called 

the ‘‘Intellectual Property Center’’ (IPR Center)—which was supposed to be a combination of the Department of Justice and the 

FBI and Department of Homeland Security and ICE, which was 

supposed to be co-located where those folks work together to share 

leads. Unfortunately, the promise of that type of coordination has 

not been fulfilled, whereas the Department of Homeland Security 

has staff that apparently the Department of Justice has not been 

able to put full-time people in there. Now, I understand there is no 

one actually staffing that center. 

So, the expectations may be the different. We think there is a lot 

of room for improvement. As I mentioned in my opening statement, 

we have another report coming out shortly which has to do with 

intellectual property protection as it is achieved at the U.S. border. 

And again, based on the work we have done both speaking to the 

private sector as well as talking to government officials, we think 

there are significant improvements that can be made in this area. 

Senator BAYH. In your previous comments about the need for 

permanence, about the need for benchmarks for progress, about allocating scarce resources in the maximum way, all those sorts of 

things, are there additional steps on top of what is currently being 

done that would benefit our efforts? 

Mr. YAGER. Absolutely. We think that many of these sound somewhat complicated to say national strategy, but, in fact, many of the 

things we talk about are very common sense, talking about the 

risks to achieving the strategy, talking about the resources. Obviously, trying to have a dialog with the Congress, you need to be 

able to talk about resource, resource needs, and what are the risks 

out there that need to be addressed; and we think that having that 

in a strategy where this kind of a dialog could take place both with 

the Congress, with the private sector, would help achieve some of 

those goals. 

Senator BAYH. I thought it was interesting in Justice’s letter to 

Chairman Leahy—and we do not have the Congressional Research 

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Service at the witness table today, but they debunked an additional 

critique which was kind of ironic since they claim that information 

sharing was very good in taking place, they suggested our approach 

would require them to share information, which the Justice Department was not accustomed to doing when it touched upon criminal prosecutions and that kind of thing, and the Congressional Research Service pointed out there are concerns in this regard were 

perhaps not well-founded. 

Mr. YAGER. If I could make a couple of comments on that, I think 

the one thing that is important to remember is that Justice is a 

very important part of this group going forward, and the group 

going forward, their main purpose is intellectual property enforcement. So, it seems hard to imagine why the Justice Department 

would be so concerned about a group trying to weaken, in fact, 

what the group was set up to achieve. Again, Justice will be an important part of this group and they would be able to contribute to 

this discussion. 

And I think also in that legislation you have the savings clause 

which allows them to determine whether the kinds of efforts or actions would be contrary to law or procedure or regulation, which 

I believe also seems to provide a reason why it would not necessarily challenge the kinds of things they have been concerned 

about. 

If I could just make one more comment relative to Senator Martinez’s point. When we are looking at different countries around the 

world—and I think this is a point that Dr. Naı ́m said—there certainly is a difference between trying to enforce rules and get the 

cooperation of a country like Paraguay, which really does not have 

a large domestic market, does not have much of a legitimate trade, 

versus China, where, in fact, they do stand to lose a lot. 

So, I think the comments about, you know, using leverage in a 

place like Paraguay or others that do not have a large domestic 

market or do not have a lot of legitimate business, certainly that 

would be a big challenge, whereas in China there is legal activity 

and significant issues to be lost. 

The other thing is as China develops and develops more firms 

and some of the intellectual property on their own, there would be 

more domestic constituencies with which to work so that they can 

say, ‘‘Yes, we are losing our own intellectual property as well as 

risking U.S. firms or taking intellectual property from the United 

States.’’ 

So, we think there is an important distinction. There are certainly countries, even China, where providing incentives to improve 

will eventually help their domestic manufacturers, as well. 

Senator BAYH. Dr. Naı ́m, you were nodding your head? 

Mr. NAI ́M. I completely agree with Dr. Yager, and that is a point 

I made in my written statement about the need for selectivity and 

being very selective and very targeted in these efforts; and, therefore, that means differentiating the Chinas from the Paraguays becomes a very important element for their success and precondition 

for success of this bill. 

Senator BAYH. Thank you. 

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Mr. Huther, about information sharing across government agencies, what has been the experience of your members in that regard? 

Can that be improved upon? 

Mr. HUTHER. Yes, sir, and in many respects I communicated that 

as recently as Tuesday of this week. 

Senator BAYH. I am sure your members found it to be shocking 

that the government was not seamlessly communicating horizontally across departments? 

Mr. HUTHER. It is difficult to do, I must say. I formerly worked 

in the government, so I think I can speak with some sense of the 

complications and complexities that are associated with it. 

Having said that, we believe that without that kind of information sharing and without creating an avenue for business to be 

kept informed on the basis of whatever intelligence business can 

provide into that data base or network of information is critical. 

The Chamber of Commerce is together with one agency and the Department of Commerce financing a new attempt to allow industry 

groups and law enforcement authorities to create via Interpol a 

new form of intelligence which could be monitoring activities globally realtime, so that, as a counterfeiting criminal act occurs in one 

country or one port, that information can be uploaded into the data 

base, and, more importantly, used very much like your legislation 

proposes: To be used by Interpol to compare and contrast against 

the same people doing money-laundering activities, such as Dr. 

Naı ́m mentioned; or human trafficking, which oftentimes can be a 

subset of the counterfeiting piracy milieu. 

So, we want to create as many opportunities to have new forms 

of information, share it as widely as we can, not to compel—we do 

not have the authority to compel people to use it, but to make it 

available to them in ways that the law enforcement community, especially in the United States, finds very helpful. 

If I could comment on Dr. Naı ́m’s comment about the Justice Department view of the question of how one goes about dealing with 

other foreign governments being a step in the wrong direction, I 

have informed them that I do not see it that way. I see your legislation supplementing already extant agreements that the U.S. Government has entered into to deal with transnational counterfeiting 

shipments of both pirated as well as counterfeiting works. 

So, if we can view this, what I see your legislation doing, or what 

we at the Chamber see your legislation doing, is adding value of 

condition of collaboration, condition of coordination, but elevating it 

to a much higher level. So, if I could use the word that all of this 

is aimed at ‘‘supplementing’’ what is out there and supplanting 

nothing, I think that is exactly what your legislation is designed 

to do. 

Senator BAYH. We were looking for allies, both horizontally in 

our country and vertically internationally, to hear sharing information across jurisdictions. Obviously, we were scrupulous in writing 

it in a way that would not compromise criminal prosecutions, but, 

that said, sharing information to the extent possible to enhance our 

efforts across agency responsibilities; and then globally looking for 

countries with similar standards, similar interests, starting, as you 

said in your book, and building from there to include those who are 

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working toward meeting those standards. Obviously, those are part 

of the problem you have to engage. You just cannot leave them out. 

Just two more questions for you. I take it by your comments you 

think that this should be a permanent priority for our government 

and not to depend on the ebbs and flows of priorities of different 

administrations and that is something useful that the legislation 

would bring, a permanence feature? 

Mr. HUTHER. That is one of the primary advantages we see. 

Senator BAYH. One other interesting thing I would appreciate 

your take on, I read with some interest the articles following the 

Administration’s filing of the recent WTO complaint with regard to 

entertainment, intellectual property and that kind of thing, and 

some of the articles tend to suggest this, taken in concert with 

some other recent actions by the Administration, constitute a gettough approach on trade, and there is always sort of a subtext. Is 

this the beginning of a protectionist move in our country, or are 

these steps designed to head off protectionist mood in our country, 

and your organization has been to expand for global trade. I hope 

it would be possible for expanding global trade, but also be for vigorous enforcement of the rules that govern global trade, in this case 

particularly those rules which in the long run will augment innovation that not only helps our country but all those who will benefit 

from it. 

So, is it possible to be for more vigorous enforcement of intellectual property standards and at the same time be for trade and not 

be labeled a protectionist? 

Mr. HUTHER. The Chamber does not find any inconsistency in 

those whatsoever. If the President of the Chamber, Tom Donahue, 

were here, he would use a phrase which he uses often, which is: 

The only thing the United States business community seeks in its 

international trading arrangements is a level playing field. And, 

frankly, I should point out, Mr. Chairman, that this is not just 

about China, this is not just about foreign governments. We have 

a very serious problem of inbred counterfeiting activity going on 

within the United States. So, we have to be as vigorous in our approach to making sure that we take steps to create an equivalent 

level playing field for our foreign trading partners, as we would expect them to do the same. And given the level playing field, we 

would look forward to the opportunity to have U.S. industry compete against the best in the rest of the world. That is all we ask. 

Senator BAYH. That is always been my altitude, as well. 

Mr. Demarais, to you, just one brief comment. I hope that your 

wife was not too offended as having been identified as a model. 

Mr. DEMARAIS. She is talking looking for her contract now. 

Senator BAYH. At least there was some silver lining to that unfortunate appropriation of her, of your family, which is one of the 

most brazen instances of packaging copying I have heard of. 

The recent action by the Administration to help protect movies 

and DVDs and that sort of thing is good as far as it goes. As I mentioned in my opening comment, it covers about 4 percent of the intellectual property theft that we experience as a country, so let me 

ask you: Did that action do anything for you, your workers, your 

products? 

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Mr. DEMARAIS. The recent action regarding the film industry? 

No, but it does create some awareness. For years, we have talked 

about this. I mean, the movie industry has been affected by this. 

I think I first visited China 15 years ago, and the first thing I was 

offered when I got off the airplane was a dollar DVD or CD tapes. 

Clearly, they have been impacted by this maybe longer than we 

have in our industry. Since then, it is a snowball effect. Every 

product that we see out there that we make in the States and Europe is subject to be counterfeited, and we hope this is something 

that we will follow through on. It is a very frustrating experience 

to go out there and promote a brand and then have somebody 

knock it off at half the price. 

And we failed to mention not only the price is an issue, but the 

quality is an issue. I do not know how many people have told me 

in certain markets in Dubai or Abu Dhabi where they sell ABRO 

products, they will not buy my products because certain ABRO 

products are failing. I get the samples back to my lab, I found out 

it is made in China or made in India. It is a double-edged sword, 

one you lose a market share because of price, and second because 

of quality. Some people take the attitude, ‘‘I can’t trust the ABRO 

name,’’ and this is something we tried to buildup over the last 40 

or 50 years. 

So, clearly, we want all industries protected, and it is going to 

take time. 

Senator BAYH. Well, and I agree. My own view is that this was 

a good step. I hope it is a first step and shows a continuing dedication on the part of this Administration and future administrations 

to creating a level playing field that we discussed here today. If you 

read some of these articles, there is some people at least raise the 

possibility because of upcoming votes on fast track and free-trade 

agreements and that kind of thing, and I hope that that is not the 

case, that, as we expand trade, we also expand our devotion to 

making sure that intellectual property is protected. It is the only 

way the global economy is going to function well, in the long run, 

at least as far as I can tell, with the humility we have to bring to 

our efforts to make it that way, implicit in my comments. 

My last question, and I will make a closing comments for all of 

us. You have been patient today and I appreciate your time in your 

efforts to join us. Just very briefly, Mr. Demarais, your workers, 

your company, what do they expect of our government when it 

comes to this kind of thing? When you experience these sorts of 

things you experience, what do they feel you then have a right to 

expect for us? 

Mr. DEMARAIS. It is a great question because we have been asking that question for the last 10 years because, as I said, we are 

the foot soldiers out there. We are the ones going to market, not 

just my employees, but my customers. The authorized ABRO dealer 

that we set up in every country, he expects something, too, because 

we are—we made a decision to work one man in this market, he 

is buying the ABRO USA product, and all of a sudden the market 

is full of non-USA ABRO products. So, what does he expect? He 

cannot believe that we cannot protect the ABRO trademark, and 

obviously employees feel the same way. 

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What do we expect from the government? I just came back from 

a trip to West Africa. I met with three or four various embassies 

over there, and they said the same thing: We need to have some 

teeth in our legislation. We need to have people on the ground that 

can enforce. It is one thing to have these laws, but unless we can 

enforcement them, unless we can work with the various countries—and every country treats intellectual property differently; 

certain countries just blow the whole area off—you are not going 

to make much progress there, no matter how much legislation you 

have. 

It is a combination of things. I think basically, though, once you 

get the legislation through, you have to have a way of enforcing it 

on the ground. 

Senator BAYH. That is an excellent comment, and I will just end 

with a little story that I think illustrates your point and part of the 

challenge that we face here. Condoleezza Rice, her first trip following becoming Secretary of State, was to China, and there was 

a story in the New York Times about her discussions with her 

counterpart, one of the big hotels in Beijing, and part of her dialog 

with this individual was to say, ‘‘Look, we really need to have more 

vigorous enforcement of intellectual property protection, it is not 

fair,’’ and he agreed with her comments and said that they just 

passed new laws, which, in fact, they had passed new laws, and 

that they would make it a priority and enforce the laws and that 

sort of thing. 

The reporter concluded the story by writing that when he left the 

hotel where this dialog had taken place, there were some of these 

kiosks out directly in front of the hotel, where for sale you could 

find recent copies DVDs of the movie ‘‘The Aviator’’ before it had 

actually been released in our own country, and a Chinese policemen was sort of walking along, paused in front of the kiosk, inspected the goods and continued casually along his way, suggesting 

that there was some distance between the discussion at the highest 

levels of government and actual enforcement at the street level 

where, of course, it needs to take place. 

So, perhaps some years ago we could afford to take a cavalier attitude about these things, but when it involves $250 billion annually and goes right to the heart of what perhaps will be our longterm comparative advantage, we need to be serious about this. We 

will never provide a perfect solution—it is not possible—but we 

need to try to do the best we can. I think you have the right to 

expect that, your workers—our taxpayers—have a right to expect 

that to bring a sense of urgency to this problem. That is why we 

had the hearing today. 

I wanted to thank all of you for your time and insights, and now 

it is up to us to take this hearing, along with our colleagues on the 

Judiciary Committee, and translate this into action. Thank you all 

very much. 

The committee is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 3:33 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.] 

[Prepared statements and responses to written questions supplied for the record follow:] 

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR GEORGE V. VOINOVICH 

Chairman Bayh and Subcommittee members, good afternoon, and thank you for 

the opportunity to testify before you at this important hearing. I welcome this hearing, and I am encouraged that you are examining the impact of intellectual property 

(‘‘IP’’) theft on American competitiveness. It is another important step in raising 

public awareness about this issue and improving our coordination and enforcement 

efforts. 

I am deeply concerned with the problem of intellectual property theft, particularly 

because such piracy has a significant impact on manufacturers, and manufacturing 

plays a vital role in Ohio’s economy. I am proud that as Governor, my administration gave high priority to manufacturing, and that it grew during this time. 

During my tenure as Governor, I worked with Ohio companies to conduct nine 

Ohio Business, Trade and Investment Missions, which were designed to open global 

markets for Ohio products. These trips spanned the globe and led to over 275 meetings between businesses and foreign government officials. These trade missions resulted in tremendous success for Ohio business—between 1991 and 1996, Ohio’s export of manufactured goods increased by an unprecedented 48 percent! During that 

time, I am proud to say that big or small—Ohio manufacturers were participating 

in the global economy. 

Since I arrived in the Senate, I have continued to fight for Ohio’s manufacturers. 

Unfortunately, I have found that participation in the global economy has a dark underside—the theft of intellectual property and the piracy of goods. After I arrived 

in the Senate, I began to hear from some of the same Ohio companies that joined 

the economic trade missions when I was Governor. These companies were facing a 

serious and growing threat—the theft of their intellectual property and competition 

from pirated products. 

As a result of these complaints, I held six oversight hearings about trade and intellectual property in the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, the Federal Workforce and 

the District of Columbia, which I chaired. Too often during these hearings, I heard 

the same story. U.S. companies would sell their products overseas, often working 

with a local partner, and soon after, the partner or some other IP thief would counterfeit and start to sell the very goods that the U.S. companies had worked to export. Most disturbing to me was the fact that when I first started to conduct hearings into this problem, the response from our own government was almost non-existent. 

During this time, I continued to express my concerns to the Administration, first 

to Secretary of Commerce Evans and USTR Zoellick, and more recently to my good 

friend Rob Portman when he was USTR, as well as Secretaries Gutierrez and 

Paulson. My message was simple; our government was not doing enough to address 

this problem, and it was failing to assist the companies that were subject to this 

theft. 

I was not content just to voice my complaints. I voted against two separate free 

trade bills with Australia and Morocco because I was trying to get the Administration to focus on the problem of IP theft. Finally, in 2004, President Bush established 

the Strategy Targeting Organized Piracy initiative (the ‘‘STOP! initiative’’). While I 

thought this was a good first step, I also believed these efforts needed an orchestra 

leader, someone who wakes up in the morning and goes to bed at night thinking 

about how to improve IP protection and enforcement. I was pleased that in July 

2005 the President appointed Chris Israel to serve as the first U.S. Coordinator for 

International Intellectual Property Enforcement. While I believe these efforts have 

started to pay dividends, and I commend the President for taking the initiative to 

improve the government’s response to the problem, the next step is for Congress to 

enact legislation to improve on this work, make it permanent, and give Congress 

an appropriate oversight role. 

This is why during the 109th Congress, I partnered with the Chairman of this 

Subcommittee, who also recognized the devastation that this problem is having on 

U.S. manufacturing, to introduce the Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Act 

(‘‘IPREA’’). Because we did not get this legislation enacted during the 109th Congress, this past February we reintroduced the IPREA (‘‘S. 522’’). The legislation 

would improve our existing enforcement efforts by: (1) providing better domestic enforcement coordination; (2) strengthening international enforcement by reaching out 

to like-minded countries and improving coordination with these countries; (3) improving congressional oversight by requiring the development of a government-wide 

IP strategic plan, and annual reports to Congress on how these efforts are faring; 

and (4) requiring the IP coordinator to work with IP stakeholders to develop resources to address their needs. 

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Just as important, this legislation keeps the next administration from reinventing 

the wheel in January 2009. In Washington, we all know that we come up with new 

ideas, and just as all the pieces are in place, we have a shift in power, and we lose 

our momentum. I do not want to lose the momentum we have gained under the 

STOP! initiative; rather, I want to continue and improve on it. Our democratic system is another thing that a lot of our competitors do not have to worry about. Countries like China—sadly—do not have Congressional elections every two years and 

Presidential elections every four years. They do not have to worry about losing their 

momentum because when a regime comes to power, it stays in power. 

While I was disappointed that we were not able to get this legislation passed during the 109th Congress, Senator Bayh and I continue to work with businesses, industry groups, and labor groups to enact it. I have also spoken with Senators Leahy 

and Specter, Chairman and Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, 

and I understand the Judiciary Committee will hold hearings on a number of IP 

items, including S. 522. I look forward to working with Members of the Judiciary 

Committee on this legislation, and I appreciate the willingness of the Chair and 

Ranking Member to examine this important issue. I would note that since we have 

reintroduced the legislation, over thirty organizations have endorsed it, including 

the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the AFL-CIO, the National Association of Manufacturers and the UAW. 

These organizations recognize that Congress can no longer ignore threats to our 

national economic security caused by IP theft; the cost is simply too great. Just to 

give you a few astonishing statistics, intellectual property theft is costing American 

business an estimated $250 billion each year and has resulted in an estimated 

750,000 jobs lost. In the global economy, where competition is as high as I have ever 

seen in my lifetime, we cannot allow such staggering losses to continue. We must 

do a better job in combating these pirates of the 21st century. 

Although I was encouraged by the USTR’s announcement on Monday that it 

would file WTO cases against China over its deficiencies in IP protection and enforcement, I am still concerned that the scope of the problem is not fully appreciated, even within the United States. Unfortunately, too often, many believe that 

intellectual property theft is an issue limited to knock-off hand bags and pirated 

DVDs and CDs. The press coverage of the USTR’s announcement seems to confirm 

this belief, as it largely focused on IP violations related to music and movies. Unfortunately, today, everything from medicine to airline and auto parts is counterfeited, 

and these fake products end up on store shelves here in the U.S. and around the 

world. These fake products are having a devastating impact on businesses both 

large and small, and pose a serious risk to consumers who cannot differentiate between genuine products and counterfeit knock-offs. 

In the global economy, one of the only ways America can continue competing is 

through our own ingenuity—it is one of our best competitive advantages. American 

manufacturing is already at a disadvantage in the foreign marketplace. Our competitors have lower wages, and they are not plagued by the same stringent regulations and rising health care and energy costs. This is why we must address intellectual property theft head-on in order to protect America’s competitive edge, so we ensure that our companies continue to enjoy the fruits of their investments and innovation. 

Thank you for allowing me to testify today, and I look forward to working with 

Senator Bayh to pass S. 522, and I would encourage our colleagues to join us as 

we move this important legislation forward. 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF MOISE ́ S NAI ́M, PH.D. 

EDITOR IN CHIEF, FOREIGN POLICY MAGAZINE

APRIL 12, 2007 

Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of the Committee, 

My name is Moises Naim and I am the Editor in Chief of Foreign Policy magazine. I am also the author of a recent book entitled Illicit: How Smugglers, Traffickers and Copycats are Hijacking the Global Economy. In this book, I summarize 

the findings of more than a decade of research into the inner workings and the consequences of illicit trafficking. I have studied the smuggling of everything from people and weapons to narcotics and human organs; and from endangered species to 

laundered money. I have also researched the trade in pirated products of all kinds, 

including medicines, automobiles, industrial parts, luxury goods, and a host of other 

commodities. 

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It is on this last illicit trade in counterfeits that our discussion focuses today, and 

on which I shall concentrate my remarks, Mr. Chairman. 

Before I begin, I want to thank you, Chairman Bayh, and your colleagues on the 

Subcommittee on Security and International Trade and Finance for giving me the 

opportunity to come before you today. The trade in illicit goods is one of the most 

pressing issues of our time and I am pleased to come before the Subcommittee. I 

also want to recognize your leadership, Mr. Chairman, in tackling the problems created by the booming global trade in counterfeits, as well as your sincere interest 

in seeking innovative solutions to contain this growing threat. 

Today I want to make five points concerning the international trade in stolen intellectual property—and offer one proposal for your consideration: 

Firstly, the international trade in counterfeited goods is just one of many illicit 

trades that have boomed in the last decade and a half. The revolutionary changes 

in technology and politics that began in the early 1990s made the movement of people, goods, information, and money easier than ever before. These changes made it 

cheaper for businesses, non-governmental organizations, churches, terrorists, and 

countless other groups and bodies to operate globally, and with more ease than at 

any time in history. 

Smugglers, always internationally-minded and always quick to detect and exploit 

price differences among neighboring nations, were among the first to take advantage of the opportunities created by globalization. Before the most recent wave of 

globalization, traffickers were primarily limited to illegally moving goods across borders between adjacent countries. But beginning in the 1990s, they could exploit 

price and cost differences globally, moving their merchandise across continents in 

large volumes. Their profits, technological and managerial sophistication, and their 

political influence increased accordingly. 

Today, smuggling on a global scale has become one of the most potent forces reshaping the world’s political and economic landscape. Yet, in contrast to the 

globalization of legitimate business, the media, or even terrorist organizations, the 

globalization of smuggling and its consequences has received little attention. 

When we actually look at the illegal, international trade in people, narcotics, timber, industrial waste, human organs, weapons of mass destruction, and other goods, 

we see interesting similarities among them. While smuggling luxury products from 

Asia to Europe may look very different than smuggling cocaine from the Andes to 

Florida, and while trafficking Central American workers to California may look different than trafficking human kidneys from China to Canada, in fact many of the 

economic forces, organizational arrangements, business models, and behavior of the 

players are quite similar. They are not the same people or criminal networks. But 

the forces that drive them and the way they are organized bear much in common. 

Governments’ responses have also been quite similar—and, in all cases, unfortunately their success has proven very elusive. There is hardly any country that can 

claim major progress in containing the growth of any of these illicit trades. Therefore, a major implication of this first point is that much that can be learned from 

past and current efforts aimed at curbing illicit trafficking in other markets, and 

these lessons can be fruitfully applied to new initiatives aimed at limiting the trade 

in stolen intellectual property. 

Secondly, a common factor in all of the illicit trades I have studied is how easy 

it is to overestimate governmental capabilities. One of the most common mistakes 

I have found in legislation aimed at controlling illicit trades is that, too often, it assumed that governments are more capable and effective than has proven to be true. 

There are many reasons for this, but the most important is that while traffickers 

are global, governments are national. Governments have a hard time working outside their national jurisdictions. The natural habitat of government is inside a nation’s borders. The natural habitat of traffickers is in-between national borders—in 

the cracks and shadows of globalization. While traffickers are perfectly at home 

when operating in these interstices, governments are slowed down, indeed often paralyzed, when working within them. 

In this respect, globalization has had very asymmetrical consequences for traffickers and for the public servants charged with chasing them. New technologies, 

political changes, and policy reforms around the globe have had the effect of empowering criminals more than governments. In some instances, they have even demonstrably weakened governments. 

This means that governments must exercise great caution when assigning new 

tasks and responsibilities to agencies and departments, and their bureaucrats. Government is indispensable in the fight to curb smuggling in general and counterfeits 

in particular. But in order to be effective, government needs to be selective in what 

it tries to achieve. It is unrealistic to expect government to combat every aspect of 

counterfeiting. History proves that it cannot. This approach will further burden alsmartinez on DSKB9S0YB1PROD with HEARING

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ready over-stretched governments and greatly reduce their effectiveness. Priorities 

are important in any policy discussion related to the fight against global counterfeiting. But, as you all know well, the hardest part of setting priorities is not deciding what to do, but rather deciding which goals, though admirable, must be cast 

aside. Nowhere is this more true than in the fight against smugglers, traffickers, 

and copycats. 

The third point is that another frequent characteristic of anti-trafficking campaigns worldwide is that they all tend to concentrate more on constraining the supply of the smuggled goods, than on limiting their demand. This fact is well known 

in the case of the United States’ War on Drugs where, resources spent on interdiction and eradication outstrip those aimed at curbing homegrown demand. It is also 

true of efforts against illegal migration which—at least until recently—were overwhelmingly devoted to stopping the illegal entry of foreigners while largely ignoring 

their American employers. 

These strategies failed, and the same risk of failure is possible in the fight against 

counterfeiters. It is important to remember that the boom in pirated goods owes as 

much to a growing demand as it does to a growing supply. We are talking about 

literally billions of consumers around the world who are willing—indeed eager—to 

buy bogus facsimiles of products at a fraction of the price of the original, lawful 

goods. This market of consumers is served by millions of some of the most innovative, ruthless, and managerially and technologically sophisticated entrepreneurs at 

work today in the global economy. 

This is a powerful market—and it is driven more by high profits than by low morals. 

Approaching this fight purely from a law-enforcement or legalistic perspective will 

miss the fact that we are in the presence of a gigantic market with millions of buyers and sellers and immense volumes of merchandise and money changing hands. 

The implication of my third point is this: it’s necessary to think about incentives, 

profits, value-chains, and business models when thinking about how to align this 

market with the needs of society. It is important to recognize that, more often than 

not, it is futile for governments to work against global markets that are this massive and powerful. It is far better to use these market forces to help achieve your 

achieve goals. It is in this spirit that I will offer a proposal for your consideration 

in just a moment. 

Before I do so, let me make a fourth point, which is simple and brief. No country 

can successfully tackle this problem acting alone. A global problem cannot be solved 

with unilateral, national efforts. Curbing the growth of the global counterfeiting 

market inevitably requires the effective coordination of several nations acting in 

concert. This is a slow, frustrating, and often ineffective process. But no other options exist. Anyone that argues in favor of a unilateral solution is mistaken. Such 

an approach will retard the adoption of more effective efforts, even as it creates the 

illusion that something is being done to deal with the problem. 

Lastly, counterfeits are undermining a critical foundation of global capitalism: 

the intellectual property rights regime. It has now become apparent that patents, 

copyrights, and other legal instruments are not affording inventors, artists and, generally speaking, the owners of intellectual property adequate protection against the 

unlawful appropriation of their property. Brands, designs, formulas, software, and 

content that has value is being routinely stolen, copied, and sold worldwide at a 

fraction of the price charged by the original owners. Entire industries have been 

devastated by piracy. 

It is equally apparent that the ability of governments to enforce the legal rights 

of owners of intellectual property is rapidly declining. Moreover, it is not at evident 

that this decline in the effectiveness of legal instruments to protect intellectual 

property can be stopped, reversed, or, in a great many cases, even slowed down. In 

some instances, it is not even clear that the countries in which major counterfeiting 

operations exist have governments with the political will or the institutional wherewithal to clamp down on counterfeiters. The massive scale of their operations, the 

employment they generate, the profits they yield, and the widespread accomplices 

that counterfeiters have in government, politics, law enforcement, the military, the 

media, and the judiciary make them a formidable political and economic force. (Too 

often they are also a formidable armed force.) 

The implication of this point is not that governments have to abandon the fight 

to ensure that intellectual property rights are protected and enforced at home and 

abroad. Rather the implication is that governments need to be supported in their 

efforts by the most intensive use possible of anti-copying technologies. In many industries in the near future, technology and science are going to be far more effective 

at protecting intellectual property rights than legal instruments and governments. 

In some industries that is already, and increasingly, the case. 

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I believe that the effectiveness of anti-piracy legislation significantly depends on 

its ability to use markets and incentives to achieve its goals. By this I mean its ability to deal not only with the supply side of illicit markets, but also and with equal 

attention to the demand for the counterfeited goods and products. And naturally, 

on how well it incorporates the fact that this is a transnational problem whose alleviation will prove elusive to actions taken by governments acting alone. 

One area that I do not believe has been sufficiently considered is the reality that 

there is much that technology can do (and is already doing) to safeguard some products from illegal copying. I therefore believe that a very promising, market-based 

solution is to include in any legislation mechanisms that will stimulate and accelerate the development and adoption of new technologies. Specifically, technologies 

that will make counterfeiting products far more difficult than what it is now. I am 

convinced that in the foreseeable future technology—not patents, sanctions, or other 

traditional means for fighting intellectual property theft—will become critical in protecting the intellectual property of innovators, creators, and artists. 

Thank you, again, Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee for affording 

me this opportunity to testify before you. I look forward to your questions and comments. 

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1See Official Testimony of John C. Stedman, Lieutenant, County of Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department before the United States Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental 

Affairs, 25 May 2005. Officer Stedman testified to an investigation that linked the sale of counterfeit cigarettes to Hezbollah fundraising. 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF BRAD HUTHER 

SENIOR ADVISOR FOR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY ENFORCEMENT, 

U.S. CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

APRIL 12, 2007 

Good afternoon Chairman Bayh and members of the subcommittee. My name is 

Brad Huther and I am appearing before you today on behalf of the U.S. Chamber 

of Commerce. The Chamber is the world’s largest business federation, representing 

more than 3 million businesses and organizations of every size, sector and region 

of the economy. 

Thank you for the leadership you and Senator Voinovich have provided on an 

issue of utmost importance to the U.S. business community. 

The Chamber commends recent government-wide efforts to increase attention to 

the global threat of counterfeiting and piracy. The last few years have witnessed the 

launch of several public-private partnerships designed to combat intellectual property (IP) crime including the Administration’s Strategy Targeting Organized Piracy 

or STOP! initiative, the Chamber’s Global Anti-counterfeiting and Piracy Initiative 

and similar regional coordination efforts within Europe and North America, just to 

name a few. The current Administration’s STOP! initiative has spurred the Department of Commerce, the Justice Department, the State Department, the United 

States Trade Representative, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Food 

and Drug Administration to elevate the importance of IP-related crime and coordinate previously disparate Federal activities to battle this crime. The Chamber and 

the more than 285 members of the Coalition Against Counterfeiting and Piracy have 

aggressively supported the STOP! initiative. This interagency effort has achieved a 

number of successes, for example, the Department of Justice charged 350 defendants with intellectual property offenses in FY2005, nearly double the number 

charged in the previous year. Additionally, 2006 saw arrests and indictments resulting from investigations conducted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement increase by 40% over the 2005 level. These successes and the efforts of the STOP! initiative provided a good first step toward a comprehensive national strategy to combat IP crime. 

Despite these and other noteworthy achievements under STOP!, the Chamber believes the Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Act is a positive and necessary 

next step critical to the battle to curtail IP theft domestically as well as globally. 

This legislation builds upon the achievements of the STOP! initiative by creating 

a better organized and permanent interagency framework allowing for more efficient 

collaboration and intelligence sharing, while recognizing the necessity to team with 

foreign governments committed to making positive strides in battling IP crimes. Enacting this legislation would clearly demonstrate that the U.S. is prepared to handle 

this category of crime with the seriousness it demands on a permanent basis and 

with global reach. 

IP fraud is an extremely lucrative and low-risk crime that threatens brand owners 

and creative innovators in all business sectors. We share your view, Mr. Chairman, 

that counterfeiting and piracy are cash-generating operations for organized criminal 

networks and terrorist activities.1 These large criminal gangs possess international 

manufacturing capabilities and sophisticated distribution channels that rival, and 

sometimes surpass, those of legitimate businesses. The Intellectual Property Rights 

Enforcement Act elevates such criminal activity to the levels of money laundering 

and black-market crimes. The Chamber supports this integrated approach in the 

fight against the theft of intellectual property. 

The business community also recognizes the need to leverage its collective resources to partner with the government in battling this scourge. The Chamber has 

developed a strategic action plan with tangible steps to stop counterfeiting and piracy. Our strategy has three major components: 

• First, to educate lawmakers, the media, businesses, innovators and consumers about health, safety and economic dangers that counterfeiters and 

pirates are imposing on us; 

• Second, to enforce the legitimate rights of small companies, manufacturers 

and retailers to protect the goodwill of their product line and to have safe, 

reliable distribution channels in the United States; 

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• Third, to engage, on a global basis, countries that are not honoring their 

international trade obligations, crack down on counterfeiters and pirates of 

intellectual property, and strengthen their borders and shipping controls. 

We believe our efforts, when combined with those of business organizations and 

governments around the globe, will create a safer marketplace for consumers, protect the jobs of American workers and expand our competitiveness internationally. 

The Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Act provides a strong foundation for 

our future collaboration. By creating an expanded and permanent interagency enforcement unit to combat IP theft, a better organized more disciplined force will 

emerge. This legislation proposes the formation of the Intellectual Property Enforcement Network (IPEN) to oversee coordination among the players I have mentioned 

and to ensure that a strategic plan to combat IP crimes is effectively implemented. 

Agencies, while retaining their autonomous nature and continuing to perform their 

essential functions and duties, would belong to a group of high-level policy makers 

under a more disciplined structure that will be better prepared to counter highly 

organized counterfeiting networks. For example, S. 522 would not modify the independent prosecutorial discretion of the Department of Justice or permit other agencies to unduly influence the essential operational duties the DOJ faces daily. IPEN 

would, however, enhance interagency cooperation and coordination on a broad range 

of strategically important activities, including intelligence sharing. 

The Chamber has actively supported the establishment of regional frameworks to 

increase cooperation on enforcement of intellectual property rights among our most 

important trading partners. Here are just a few relevant examples of new enforcement efforts that are being pursued in ways that we believe are complementary to 

the global Intellectual Property Enforcement Network which you and Senator 

Voinovich have proposed in S. 522: 

• The EU-US Action Strategy for the Enforcement of Intellectual Property 

Rights includes fifteen bilateral, multilateral and public-private action 

strategies, many of which involve the sharing of enforcement intelligence 

with relevant law enforcement authorities; 

• The Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America contains similar 

action items, most notably a goal to ‘‘develop a network of enforcement professionals among the governments of Canada, Mexico and the United States 

to jointly collaborate on enforcement against transnational counterfeiting 

and piracy.’’ The three governments are currently considering ways of identifying authorized law enforcement officials to conduct domestic criminal investigations and prosecutions of counterfeiters and pirates and enhancing 

domestic industry/government cooperation and information sharing; and 

• At the G8 Leaders Summit in St. Petersburg last year, a comprehensive IP 

enforcement strategy was announced, which included an agreement 

‘‘. . . on a plan to establish a formal IP law enforcement infrastructure 

within the G8 . . . for the pursuit of joint law enforcement operations targeted at IP crimes.’’ 

IPEN would provide an excellent platform with which the U.S. private sector can 

interact to express its concerns and provide intelligence on criminal activity. The 

business community has a clear role to play by contributing its expertise and resources to assist the government in taking on all aspects of counterfeiting, including 

those relating to technical assistance and capacity building. Company-financed investigations, which complement the work of law enforcement officials, will have 

grater leveraged benefits via IPEN as well. Through the promotion of greater private sector collaboration and enhanced channels of communication, we believe IPEN 

will have a substantially more efficient and increased capacity to obtain and distribute intelligence on Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) crimes simultaneously to 

all relevant agencies. 

Accordingly, we believe the Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Act articulates a clear and compelling need for greater international enforcement cooperation 

in battling IP crimes. IPR crime adversely affects countries that are our potential 

trading partners. While all recent Free Trade Agreements contain substantive sections regarding intellectual property rights protection and enforcement, without 

greater international IPR enforcement activities the investment climate and trading 

environment in these countries will be hampered. The Intellectual Property Rights 

Enforcement Act would be invaluable in creating a framework that rewards countries for having legal regimes that enforce IP laws, shut down piracy operations, arrest and prosecute those who commit IP crimes, and for having officials with the 

authority to inspect, seize and destroy counterfeit goods at ports of entry. 

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On June 14, 2005, I testified before the Senate Subcommittee on Oversight of 

Government Management, The Federal Workforce and the District of Columbia regarding the STOP! initiative. The Chamber’s view then was that STOP! provided 

an excellent example of interagency collaboration and offered considerable promise 

in the fight against IP theft. We recommended, however, that provisions of the Government Performance and Results Act, especially those relating to establishing performance indicators and the means for validating actual versus planned achievement of them, are rigorously applied to measure the Administration’s progress. Essential to the proper functioning of any interagency program is a requirement for 

increased oversight, including involving stakeholders in advising the Congress and 

the administration in the process of developing appropriate metrics for the measurement of success. By establishing performance indicators and the means for validating actual versus planned achievements, and linking them to the resources necessary for success, IPEN should achieve even greater advances in the future. We 

are pleased to see that S. 522 incorporates these important concepts. 

The Chamber understands how important this battle is and stands ready to support the enactment and implementation of this legislation. 

Thank you, Chairman Bayh, for focusing on a dangerous and very real threat to 

our economy, jobs for our citizens, and the holders of intellectual property rights. 

I appreciate the opportunity to provide testimony and will be happy to respond to 

any questions you may have. 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF TIM DEMARAIS 

VICE PRESIDENT, ABRO INDUSTRIES

APRIL 12, 2007 

Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee: 

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to testify regarding one of America’s 

most contentious foreign trade issues—the theft of intellectual property worldwide. 

My name is Tim Demarais and I am the Vice President of ABRO Industries which 

we believe is one of the most unique and innovative international trading companies 

in the USA today. ABRO Industries traces its corporate roots back to 1939 when 

our founder began working with manufacturers in the USA selling their products 

in the international market place. In the 1970’s, the ‘‘ABRO’’ brand was developed 

as part of a long term sales strategy to sell USA automotive products internationally 

under a single brand name. We initially concentrated on selling our ABRO products 

in third world markets and there was no place in the world we would not travel 

to introduce our ABRO brand. We visited such diverse markets as Nigeria, Congo, 

Pakistan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Sierra Leone just to name a few. We now sell 

our ABRO products in over 150 countries. We continue to ‘‘ABROnize’’ new products 

on an annual basis and we now offer over 200 ABRO products to our dedicated 

ABRO customer base internationally. 

In time, our ABRO automotive products became the brand of choice in most global 

markets but unfortunately today the ABRO name has also become the brand of 

choice to ‘‘counterfeit’’ by unscrupulous manufacturers worldwide. They say that 

imitation is the ‘‘ultimate form of flattery’’ but we certainly are not ‘‘flattered’’ that 

companies are literally stealing millions of dollars of legitimate ABRO sales annually in clear violation of international intellectual property rights. We recognized 

early that our trademark was one of the most important assets we own and over 

the past 38 years, we have registered the ABRO trademark in 167 countries. We 

also own 1,085 registrations in numerous international classifications as we consider 

intellectual property protection of paramount importance. We have spent hundreds 

of thousands of dollars registering our ABRO trademark and ironically, we have 

spent an equal amount of money in defending our ABRO trademark worldwide 

against importers of counterfeit ABRO products. 

Although we can point to many examples of counterfeiters overseas, one foreign 

company who has taken intellectual property violation to a new level is Hunan 

Magic of China. We did not know we had a problem with this company until 2001 

when we received an e-mail from our Bosnian distributor requesting that he would 

like to buy ABRO products from our Chinese subsidiary. I knew we did not have 

a Chinese subsidiary and went to the Canton Trade Fair later that year and was 

absolutely shocked to see Hunan Magic’s booth which had a full display of all of 

our ABRO products and the company was actively selling ABRO products to many 

overseas customers visiting the show. The company had literally ‘‘stolen’’ our corporate identity stating they owned the ABRO name. 

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I immediately contacted the show officials and advised them that this company 

was illegally selling our ABRO products as we own the ABRO trademark. After I 

substantiated the fact that we hold the official ABRO trademark registration in 

China, the show officials agreed to ‘‘raid’’ the booth with me and I was stunned 

when the General Manager of the Chinese company produced documentation that 

showed they had the rights to the trademark in China. Later it was discovered this 

‘‘documentation’’ was an application and not the actual trademark itself. There was 

obviously uncertainty at that point at the show until I picked up a sample of our 

ABRO Epoxy that Hunan Magic was displaying at their booth. Our ABRO Epoxy 

is a product that I personally developed 20 years ago. At that time, we were not 

doing $100 Million a year in sales and we were somewhat ‘‘low budget’’ and I had 

taken a picture of my wife applying epoxy to our bicycle and then put this photo 

on a blister card. The product has become one of our most popular selling ABRO 

products with millions of units being sold annually. I immediately asked the General Manager of Hunan Magic who the lady was on his ABRO Epoxy card and he 

told the show officials it was some ‘‘western’’ model. I reached in my wallet and 

pulled out a picture of my wife which finally convinced the show authorities we actually owned the trademark and they closed down the booth and Hunan Magic was 

cited for using our ABRO trademark illegally. We thought the matter was settled 

until the next trade show when Hunan Magic changed the packaging slightly by deleting the face of my wife and replacing it with a face of an Asian woman but keeping everything else the same including our ABRO name. This story was the subject 

of a cover story article in The Wall Street Journal in November 2004 and we 

thought the notoriety would convince the Chinese government to do something 

about controlling this renegade Chinese manufacturer. Unfortunately, their illegal 

activity has become even more blatant as Hunan Magic is now selling the ABRO 

brand of products in all of our major markets and their General Manager has publicly stated that ‘‘his’’ ABRO brand is one of the most successful brands they have 

ever introduced. 

Since the Chinese government will not enforce intellectual property laws to protect our ABRO name, we are forced to take legal action in the various markets 

where these counterfeit products are being sold. For the past several years, we have 

spent most of our time traveling overseas not actively marketing our ABRO products as we should be but basically working with in-country attorneys and local police and Custom officials to try to seize and destroy these counterfeit products once 

they enter the foreign country. Last month, I took a business trip to West Africa 

and in Cameroon successfully led raids against wholesale shops who were selling 

counterfeit ABRO products. Thousands of cartons of counterfeit ABRO products 

were seized and will be eventually destroyed. I did hold meetings with the Commercial Attaches at U.S. Embassies in Nigeria, Ghana and Cameroon and was told by 

all of the Embassy personnel that intellectual property violations are growing rapidly in their respective markets and they wish they had more ‘‘teeth’’ to try to enforce intellectual property laws. 

That is why we are thrilled by the new Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement 

Act that is now being introduced in the Senate by Senator George Voinovich and 

Senator Bayh. We all know about the War on Terror that is being fought globally 

but in the business community we look at intellectual property violations as a war 

on economic terrorism as these companies who are counterfeiting are stealing patents, trademarks, ideas and designs from American companies. We are all aware 

this illicit activity is costing U.S. companies sales, profits and jobs. 

It was encouraging to note that recently the U.S. Government announced it will 

ask the World Trade Organization to organize meetings to address deficiencies in 

China’s protection of intellectual property rights on books, music, videos and movies. 

However, there is no mention of many other U.S. products that are being counterfeited including automotive parts and accessories. We hope that the U.S. Government will address deficiencies in all areas of intellectual property violations. When 

the U.S. agreed to grant China WTO status, China certainly received tremendous 

trade benefits which is evident by all of the Chinese goods that are sold in the U.S. 

However, with WTO benefits come WTO obligations and the U.S. Government must 

insist that the Chinese government live up to these obligations as counterfeit merchandise from China is responsible for the loss of more than 750,000 American jobs. 

We feel very passionate about the new Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement 

Act as we deal with counterfeit issues on a daily basis and this is not just a growing 

trade problem for ABRO Industries but a problem all USA manufacturers face internationally. The past five years have been most frustrating as ABRO’s biggest competitor is not STP, General Electric, Bondo, ITW or some other well known automotive chemical manufacturer but our biggest competitor has become ABRO products from China which is clearly not how our American dream to ‘‘ABROnize’’ the 

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world was expected to play out. It was mentioned in the The Wall Street Journal 

article in November 2004 that the intellectual property problem we are facing in 

China is a classic ‘‘David vs. Goliath’’ story. The 23 people at ABRO Industries can 

only do so much against this economic super power. We only ask that the U.S. Government treat the intellectual property matter more vigorously and pass legislation 

that will correct these trade injustices and then provide various agencies overseas 

the effective ‘‘muscle’’ to enforce this new trade legislation. 

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to testify today and allow me to vent 

some of my personal past frustrations on this matter. We continue to fight the battle in the overseas sales trenches every day—but we do need some help from the 

‘‘generals’’ back here in Washington. This war on economic terrorism can be won but 

it is going to take a concentrated effort by everyone here in Washington to force 

China to comply with their WTO obligations which requires this economic super 

power to enforce intellectual property laws in their own country. 

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RESPONSE TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR BAYH 

FROM MOISE ́ S NAI ́M 

Q.1. On page 255 of your book, Illicit, you assert that a smart multilateral approach to combating illicit trade has to be selective. You 

cite the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the anti-money laundering initiative, as a good model for multilateral enforcement cooperation. In referencing FATF, you highlight the organization’s selectivity as the key to its success. Countries join only if they are 

able to meet a list of qualifications, and consequently not every 

country is invited to join. Rather, the key to FATF’s success is mutual trust, which can only be generated by establishing standards 

as part of a ‘‘careful, deliberate process.’’ 

Regarding intellectual property protection, the United States 

should continue to actively engage China, India, Brazil, and other 

sources of counterfeit products through bilateral and multilateral 

efforts. However, do you agree that an effective international enforcement mechanism must be limited to countries that can meet 

high standards, and who have demonstrated a commitment to enforcement, even if China, India, and Brazil would not be ready to 

initially participate in such an arrangement? 

A.1. I do agree that the FATF model has much to offer and that 

its essential structure and approach should be replicated as much 

as possible in multilateral efforts to combat counterfeiting. I also 

agree that—as stated in your question—the United States should 

continue to also actively engage countries that are major producers 

of counterfeited products. It is possible that the solution lies in creating a sequential process whereby an initial core group of countries [major counterfeit consuming countries] can later be enlarged 

to include others [major counterfeit producing countries]. It is important to note that many industrialized countries where most 

companies which are victims of counterfeiting are headquartered 

are, at the same time, home to the largest consumer population of 

counterfeited products. 

With time, and after consolidating its operations, this initial 

FATF-like structure can then be enlarged to also include countries 

that are the sources of these counterfeits. In any case, creating a 

FATF-like structure to combat counterfeiting is, in my mind, a welcome step. I stand ready to elaborate on these and other points 

that the Subcommittee may have. 

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