Our International Alert on DDTC's ITAR Consent Agreement with Keysight Technologies was covered in International Trade Today's Export Compliance Daily newsletter. In the Alert, tBrian J. Fleming,* Timothy P. O'Toole, Christopher Stagg,* Caroline J. Watson, Manuel Levitt, and Mary H. Mikhaeel argued that the State Department's Directorate of Defense Trade Controls’ (DDTC) recent settlement with Keysight highlights the critical importance of companies ensuring the correctness of their jurisdiction and classification assessments – particularly with respect to the International Traffic in Arms Regulations’ (ITAR) application to intangibles, such as software and technical data. It also shows DDTC continues to reward cooperation and other mitigating factors with significant penalty reductions as it tries to incentivize companies to voluntarily disclose violations and work with the agency during its investigation. Additionally, the Keysight case displays the numerous considerations that must be carefully examined when there is a jurisdiction and classification dispute with the government, including the heightened importance in this context of DDTC’s commodity jurisdiction procedure for an official determination. 

*Former Miller & Chevalier attorney