Privacy in China

Javier Schmidt

Dr.Trittipo 

International Marketing

27 March 2017

Piracy in China

Question 1: Assume you are the CEO of a new firm that has perfected a package of software applications for medium- and large-sized companies to help manage intellectual property applications (patents, trademarks, copyrights). Licenses for companies in the United States have sold briskly, at $2000 per company for more than a year. Now you have heard rumors that your software is being pirated in China. Ironic, isn’t it? Write a briefing for your board of directors with a specific plan of action to address this leakage of your intellectual property into the Chinese market.

ANSWER: The Chinese idea of piracy of intellectual properties is very different to the United States, in the 2010 BSA Global Software Piracy Study China Awareness of Software Acquisition Channels states that the Chinese consumer exhibit one of the greatest confusion over what legal vs illegal ways to acquire software. More than half say all software accusations are legal even P2P sharing or loaning information from others. As the CEO of a software application I would see this as free marketing in that region that was a previously unexplored and then in turn use this to expand into that region before taking legal action and closing down the fakers in that Chinese market. Using this to your advantage in seeing this as expanding market share opportunity before taking actions with the authorities and having these stores closed down. After our company does its research and see if it’s worth putting up our own stores in the area where they are being used by counterfeiters.