Where Your Nth Party Liabilities Start and End June 19, 2024, 11 am EST Sign Up Here Among the many challenges risk professionals face is understanding the true depth and breadth of their third-party risks. The scope and scale of assessing, managing, and mitigating third-party risk is constantly evolving, with increasing regulatory, shareholder, and market scrutiny, as well as increasing demands for transparency, auditability, and...
Sigma-Aldrich, Inc., d/b/a MilliporeSigma (“MilliporeSigma”), a U.S. life sciences company based in Massachusetts, escaped criminal charges for export control violations, despite a former sales person’s scheme to illegally export products to China. DOJ cited the favorable resolution as proof of the National Security Division’s commitment to its voluntary disclosure program. MilliporeSigma was the first company to resolve an investigation for export control violations under DOJ/NSD’s...
The U.S. Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division has intensified its scrutiny of healthcare platforms that integrate doctors with insurers, data, and other assets. Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter described this trend as an “alarming” concentration of resources. In a significant move, the DOJ announced the establishment of the Task Force on Health Care Monopolies and Collusion. Kanter emphasized during a Washington Post Live event that...
Over the last ten years, we have seen a marked shift from the Delaware Chancery Court chipping away at corporate board member liability claims. In a number of seminal cases involving Boeing airplane crashes (In re the Boeing Co. Derivative Litig., No. 2019-0907 (Del. Ch. Sept 7, 2021)), and deadly listeria outbreaks from tainted ice cream (Marchand v. Barnhill, 212 A.3d 805 (Del. 2019)), Delaware...
It may seem like a Herculean task — but it can be done. I regularly opine that mitigating sanctions risks for your third-party population is an easier task than doing so for your anti-corruption risks. One big reason — geography is an important limiter on sanctions risks. The ability to evade sanctions has to be financially practicable — for example, it makes no sense to...
While OFAC’s enforcement actions and guidance points to important steps exporters must take when relying on third-party distributors and other intermediaries, the “reason to know” and affirmative obligations to monitor resale and distribution of products to ultimate users does not appear to be unreasonable or impractical. In terms of best practices, these are issues that need to be addressed. The supply chain and third-party risk...
Companies rely on robust distribution chains as an efficient mechanism to enter new markets without requiring a significant investment. Additionally, companies may maintain parallel sales activities in markets between their own sales staff and third-party distributors, agents, resellers and dealers. It is interesting how certain industries have evolved and relied on different models for use of third parties with the intent of reaching customers in...
Sorry to start a four-part series with a reference to music from our long-ago past. The Four Tops sang the “Same Old Song, with a Different Meaning” (released in 1965 — Video Here). So, how does that relate to third-party risks? Well, bear with me here for a little. Legal and Compliance bloggers, compliance vendors, prognosticators, Compliance Podcasters, and everyone in the Paparazzi have written,...
Directive 2019/1937 of the European Parliament and Council dated 23 October 2019 on the “protection of persons who report breaches of Union law” (the “Directive”) is currently being implemented by EU Member States. The directive has broad applicability to organizations operating in the EU internal market and applies to both public and private sector organizations alike. Whistleblowers are guaranteed legal protection to the extent: (1)...
On April 29, 2024, the U.S. Department of Commerce officially published a final rule in the Federal Register that formally incorporates a medical device license exception into the Export Administration Regulations (“EAR”) for certain commodities bound for the Russian Federation, Belarus, and occupied regions of Ukraine. New license exception MED—located at 15 C.F.R. Section 740.23—now authorizes the export, re-export, and transfer (in country) of certain EAR99...
