Replies to post #107373 on InterDigital Inc (IDCC)

[georgebailey]

xdx: good work and duly noted. Obviously a file that I hope will not be revisted.

[Learning2vest]

Found several ICC news items that appeared to be encouraging after reading your post xdx. There are two on March 22, 2005 that talk about the importance of Intellectual Property, and then the one you mentioned about one of ICC's top dogs visiting Finland April 22, 2005(BTW - Found her speech topic to be very interesting given the situation we are following.) See copy/paste items below;

First, the item coming out of ICC HQ in Paris'
.............................................................................................................

"Spreading the word about intellectual property rights


Paris, 22 March 2005 - The importance of intellectual property (IP) rights -
a subject that covers a multitude of products from books to cars to drugs -
is gradually gaining ground in business and among the general public
throughout the world. But that said, the problems of IP theft are rapidly
escalating and debate continues to rage over the role and scope of the
patent system, says the International Chamber of Commerce.

Its concerns are highlighted in a new edition - the sixth - of the roadmap
charting current and emerging IP issues, prepared by the ICC Commission on
Intellectual Property, which drew on the knowledge of 240 IP experts
worldwide from all sectors of business. To take one worrying example, the
roadmap says that efforts to harmonize patent laws worldwide have become
politicized, and are stalled . A European Union directive on patenting
computer-implemented inventions is singled out as being the subject of a
political tug-of-war. .

The roadmap has been welcomed by users worldwide as being "an important tool
to help businessmen and policy makers fully understand the importance of
intellectual property for progress". Readers from Europe, Latin America,
North America and Asia applauded the roadmap as providing "an outstanding
strategic view of the most relevant intellectual property issues today".

The new roadmap was presented to a meeting of the IP commission at ICC's
Paris headquarters. On a broader front, BASCAP (Business Action to Stop
Counterfeiting and Piracy), a new ICC initiative to mobilise business to
stop counterfeiting, reported that it has made an encouraging start. David
Benjamin, BASCAP's task force chair, said it has been warmly welcomed by ICC
national committees, the World Trade Organization and Interpol. He saw it
developing as a practical tool bringing together the best practices for the
enforcement of property rights throughout the world, based on real cases.

Maria Livanos Cattaui, whose third and final term as Secretary General of
ICC will end mid-2005, said that the initiative is an "effort to act as we
realize that the entire industrial and service sector is in danger because,
despite advanced globalization, the concept of IP rights is still in its
infancy."

How best to spread the word about the threats to IP was discussed by Arnoud
de Meyer, Deputy Dean of INSEAD, a business school based in France and
Singapore. He said he preferred to speak of "the theft of intellectual
property to the more common term of piracy, because pirates have something
romantic about them." Piracy is probably too useful a word to be discarded,
but everyone agreed that there was nothing romantic about IP crime."

ICC's Roadmap of Current and Emerging Intellectual Property Issues for
Business can be found at
http://www.iccwbo.org/iproadmap
........................................................................................................

And look what the top priority topic was as one of the ICC top dogs visited Washington, D.C. on the same day in March;


"ICC Chairman visits US Department of the Treasury

Washington, 22 March 2005

ICC Chairman Yong Sung Park, accompanied by Peter Robinson, President-Elect,
USCIB; Charles Heeter, Deloitte & Touche; and Stephen Canner, Vice
President, USCIB, met with the U.S. Treasury Department's Assistant
Secretary for International Affairs, Randal Quarles, today at the U.S.
Treasury headquarters.

Mr Park introduced himself as the newly-elected Chairman of ICC and informed
Mr Quarles of four major issues of importance to ICC members:

1) - protection of intellectual property and ICC's Business Action to Stop
Counterfeiting and Piracy (BASCAP) initiative;

2) - corporate governance; 3) - the World Trade Organization's Doha round
of trade negotiations; and 4) - corruption.

Mr Park emphasized that BASCAP has already developed an action plan to
coordinate and facilitate industry, national, and international efforts to
compel governments to enforce laws protecting intellectual property and that
the plan has received full support from ICC members worldwide.

He also informed Mr Quarles that ICC hosted a very successful roundtable
discussion of governance issues in Beijing in October, with representation
from 20 countries and attendance by more than 70 participants. ICC is now
working on a second roundtable, scheduled to take place in April in
Istanbul, which will focus on the sharing of experience by businesses in
undertaking governance measures.

Mr Park said that the successful conclusion of the Doha round of trade
negotiations was an item of highest priority for ICC. Mr Quarles thanked Mr
Park for ICC's support, noting that the negotiations have been difficult.

Mr Park explained that fighting bribery and corruption was another leading
area of ICC activity and that ICC had produced a handbook for its members on
practical steps that businesses can adopt to deal with bribery at the
company level. He provided a copy of the handbook to Mr Quarles for his
information."

............................................................................................................

Hmmmm....... sure looks like the ICC was bowing it's back on intellectual property back in March. Let's see what the ICC Secretary-General had to say in Finland a month later(my bold on some of the comments about her speech);

"ICC Secretary General meets Finnish President

Helsinki, 22 April 2005

The President of Finland, Tarja Halonen, yesterday
> received ICC Secretary General Maria Livanos Cattaui, accompanied by the
> Chair and the Secretary General of ICC Finland, Markku Pohjola and Timo
> Vuori, respectively, at the Presidential Palace in Helsinki.
>
> President Halonen, who previously served as Co-Chair of the International
> Labour Organization's World Commission on the Social Dimension of
> Globalization, and Mrs Cattaui discussed issues in the global economy and
> the roles governments and business should play in tackling some of the
most
> pressing issues relating to development and poverty. President Halonen and
> Mrs Cattaui agreed that domestic companies and local entrepreneurs were
key
> factors in economic development and the eradication of poverty. They
agreed
> that governments should be responsible for establishing the most
favourable
> local conditions, including business-friendly legislation. Even in a
global
> economy, the elements for success are created at the local level.
>
> Following her appointment with the President, Mrs Cattaui met with Finnish
> Minister of Foreign Affairs Erkki Tuomioja, to discuss the Helsinki
Process
> on Globalization and Democracy. The Finnish Government initiative, in
> co-operation with the Tanzanian Government, aims to bring together
northern
> and southern countries to debate democracy, human rights and the
environment
> in the context of globalization. Mr Tuomioja co-chairs the Helsinki
Process
> and Mrs Cattaui is one of three business experts in a high-level advisory
> group known as the Helsinki Group.
>
> Earlier in the day Mrs Cattaui, whose third and final term as ICC
Secretary
> General will end mid-2005, delivered a speech at ICC Finland's annual
> meeting. The speech was entitled: Standing up for the global economy:
> Challenges and risks from the business perspective.
>
> Mrs Cattaui emphasized that the role of governments in the global economy
> should be kept crystal clear.
>
> "Governments are primarily responsible for creating the legal frameworks
for
> political and economical actions," she said. "States must live up to and
> implement their international roles and obligations and it is the duty of
> business to obey all laws and uphold the highest practices, not as
> substitutes for government, but as creators of wealth."
>
> Mrs Cattaui added that one of the biggest contributions of business and
the
> private sector was spreading their knowledge and experiences, including
> technical know how, to hasten development, particularly in developing
> countries. Mrs Cattaui underscored that governments must stand ready to
> create supportive conditions for local entrepreneurship and private
> investment.
>
> Following the speech, the Finnish community awarded Mrs Cattaui its
highest
> medal of merit, the Chamber of Commerce Cross. The award was presented, on
> the initiative of ICC Finland, by representatives of the leading Finnish
> business organization, the Central Chamber of Commerce of Finland. It was
> bestowed in recognition of Mrs Cattaui's contributions, at the highest
> level, to world business and chambers of commerce alike.
>
> The ICC Secretary General's two-day visit to Finland also included a
dinner
> attended by Finnish business leaders. The dinner was hosted by ICC Finland
> Chair Markku Pohjola, who is also Deputy CEO of Nordea.

......................................................................................................

Interesting time and place for an ICC executive to be giving that particular speech! Hmmmm......do any of these dots connect???? If they did, it might show the ICC raising the attention level on Intellectual Property earlier this year, and being certain folks in the U.S. and Finland got the message.