July.31.2013
Congratulations to our partner Rob McKenna who has joined the National Alliance for Jobs and Innovation's (NAJI) Board of Directors and will serve as NAJI President. NAJI is a non-partisan organization of over 200 members whose mission is to help stop unfair competition resulting from stolen intellectual property - whether through piracy, counterfeiting or trade secret theft.
"I am enormously excited to help keep a spotlight on the issue of IP theft and its serious impacts on American jobs and economic growth," said Mr. McKenna, who co-heads Orrick's Public Policy Group. "Our country's ability to create and maintain good-paying jobs in manufacturing and information technology is among the most crucial challenges we face. When foreign competitors steal our IT and IP and use it to compete unfairly against American companies, we not only lose jobs and reduce growth, we also discourage our innovators' creative and entrepreneurial spirit. We simply cannot afford to allow unfair competition to steal our future."
The Business Software Alliance estimates that over $60 billion worth of software is stolen globally each year, providing the companies that steal this software and other information technology with an unfair competitive cost advantage over their competitors.