great company

...I'll take it.

After two years and thousands of hours of investigation in conjunction with law enforcement agencies in China, Taiwan and Japan, the company said it had uncovered something far more ambitious than clandestine workshops turning out inferior copies of NEC products. The pirates were faking the entire company.

Evidence seized in raids on 18 factories and warehouses in China and Taiwan over the past year showed that the counterfeiters had set up what amounted to a parallel NEC brand with links to a network of more than 50 electronics factories in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan…

…These records showed that the counterfeiters carried NEC business cards, commissioned product research and development in the company's name and signed production and supply orders.

He said they also required factories to pay royalties for "licensed" products and issued official-looking warranty and service documents.

via. I think that last bit's so elegant that it drops a hint that IP theft has now officially become a kind of art form. If you were going to set up a regional manufacturing network from scratch and go to the trouble of maintaining it, wouldn’t you want your own name on it? NEC might be a recognized brand and the fakers would save on advertising and marketing by piggybacking them, but frankly I think the extra profit from this would be marginal in comparison to the thought and effort extended. Maybe these days, the romance of entrepreneurship lies in starting somebody else’s company.

But what’s a fake tycoon going to do with his money? Buy a fake Ferrari, of course.

Comments

[neal]

i love piracy on an ideological level simply because it represents culture/corporate jamming at its very best.

[Alex]

..until the pressurisation valve in the plane YOU'RE travelling in turns out to come from "Lokheed"...

Sorry. This is cool, though, especially because NEC is a very technically-dense, difficult company to fake. Fake tyres, or copied CDs, are one thing. Fake SS7 switches...now yer talking.

[jamie]

Travel with Lokheed and you're deed.

...even more sorry (blush)

[Chris Williams]

Given the nature of my email handle, it falls to me to put out that, historically, travelling with Lockheed wasn't always such a good idea either:
http://www.aural-innovations.com/robertcalvert/lyrics/callyr.htm#salesman