ARTICLE
If you run an import-only business and never ship goods out of the United States, you may not have spent much time considering U.S. export controls. They don’t affect you, do they? Actually, they may. You might be surprised to learn that U.S. export controls don’t just control the export of tangible goods. They control the export (including the electronic “release”) of intangible items, too—including ideas; design work like technical drawings, blueprints, detailed product specifications or CAD files; and software source and object code. Perhaps you operate your U.S. business on a model where you send designs by email or through a collaboration platform to contractors or manufacturing partners outside the United States, but you never send physical goods. Maybe you occasionally send prototypes to accompany the design files, but not items offered for sale. Or perhaps you work for a company that only trades in ideas and electronic files, working to develop new mobile applications or software with developers around the world. Read more!
If you run an import-only business and never ship goods out of the United States, you may not have spent much time considering U.S. export controls. They don’t affect you, do they? Actually, they may. You might be surprised to learn that U.S. export controls don’t just control the export of tangible goods. They control the export (including the electronic “release”) of intangible items, too—including ideas; design work like technical drawings, blueprints, detailed product specifications or CAD files; and software source and object code. Perhaps you operate your U.S. business on a model where you send designs by email or through a collaboration platform to contractors or manufacturing partners outside the United States, but you never send physical goods. Maybe you occasionally send prototypes to accompany the design files, but not items offered for sale. Or perhaps you work for a company that only trades in ideas and electronic files, working to develop new mobile applications or software with developers around the world.
Read more!