Lexpert Magazine

64 LEXPERT MAGAZINE | MARCH 2016 TECHNOLOGY | COLUMNS | George Takach is a senior partner at McCarthy Tétrault LLP and the author of Computer Law. underpin DTL's activities around the world. In the next two columns, we'll see specifically how the TPP's e-commerce and IP chapters assist a company like DTL. But there are a number of other sections in the TPP that impact a company like DTL. BROAD SCOPE OF THE TPP e TPP is an incredibly comprehensive agreement. It has 30 chapters. ose cover- ing trade in "goods" include the following: trade in goods (essentially reducing and in most cases eliminating tariffs on some 18,000 items); special rules on trading in textiles; rules of origin (addressing which goods qualify for the tariff reductions); customs administration / trade facilitation (to allow exporters/importers to get their goods across borders more easily); sani- tary/phytosanitary measures (so that bona fide public health measures don't become disguised barriers to trade); and technical barriers to trade (to harmonize technical standards, or at least get governments to recognize each other's standards). For years before and aer the second world war, trade liberalization essentially meant these sorts of measures, focusing on reducing tariffs and other barriers to mov- ing physical products across borders. In- deed, by the time of Confederation (in the 1880s and 1890s), Canadian industry had been built up behind a wall of high tariffs that produced in Canada a "branch plant economy," where a single manufacturing operation produced a broad array of prod- ucts with fairly short production runs for each (because they were sold only into the tiny domestic Canadian market). Interest- ingly, at the time of Laurier, when he pro- posed a significant trade-liberalization deal with the Americans in 1911, he promptly lost the federal election over the issue (set- ting back the cause of free trade, especially with the Americans, for decades). A different result, however, ensued in 1988 when Prime Minister Mulroney fought and won (resoundingly) a federal election on the proposed Free Trade Agree- ment with the US (later expanded to in- clude Mexico in the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA). GOODS TO SERVICES NAFTA, like the TPP, goes beyond tariff reductions and the trade of goods, and also covers services. ere are sections dealing with trade in services; financial services specifically; temporary entry for business persons (assisting with the short-term movement of employees across the borders of the signatories to the agreement); tele- communications; and government pro- curement (governing how public bodies manage major acquisitions of goods and services, to ensure fairness among the bid- ders emanating from different jurisdictions who belong to the trade treaty). ere's more. e TPP also has provi- sions dealing with: competition policy (because differing competition rules could distort the market); state-owned enter- prises (particularly relevant for those in- dustries where there is a major presence of government-owned entities); small and medium-sized enterprises (to help ensure that smaller companies get access to eco- nomic opportunities); transparency and anti-corruption (because all the other dis- ciplines operating on the trading parties and their companies will be for naught if unscrupulous governments and businesses flaunt the rules through bribes, kickbacks and worse); and dispute settlement (how to handle contentious issues, so as to avoid trade wars). DTL AND GLOBAL TRADE So, back to DTL and their goal to become the premier learning technology company in the world. ey need to be able to spe- cialize in this vertical market, which is quite small in Canada, but on a global ba- sis is big and profitable. But for DTL to do business around the world with confidence, ideally their soware will be protected from misappropriation wherever they have customers — that will revolve around the IP chapter of the TPP that we'll consider in a later column. Equally, DTL will want to be able to con- duct distance-selling with customers, part- ners and suppliers from around the world (and more on that and the e-commerce provisions next month). But also, as DTL sets up subsidiary companies and offices in various key markets outside of Canada, it wants to know that these facilities will not be expropriated or interfered with unfairly (especially in a discriminatory manner sim- ply because they are "foreign-owned" by a Canadian entity) — and hence the impor- tance of investor-protection provisions in trade agreements like the TPP. ere are the other benefits to compa- nies like DTL from trade arrangements, including being able to move staff around to different offices in the world on a tempo- rary basis; and the certainty that wherever it does business, it is treated the same way (i.e., "national treatment") as a business owned and operated by "locals" in that ju- risdiction. is is the comfort level that the TPP would give to a Canadian company like DTL — and to a foreign company wanting to come to Canada. And we are all the richer for it. IF WE TRIED TO PULL a "North Korea" in terms of economic autarky, we would be about as poor as the Hermit Kingdom. Instead, because of our ability to trade with other countries around the world (but particularly the US), we have come to enjoy a high standard of living

• cover
• Masthead
• ProfessionalOpportunities
• People On The Move
• Big