Comments are due June 6 on a Neodron Tariff Act Section 337 complaint at the International Trade Commission, seeking a ban on imports of touch-controlled smartphones, tablets and computers that allegedly infringe its patents, said Wednesday's Federal Register. The Ireland-based company alleges Amazon, Dell, HP, Lenovo, Microsoft, Motorola and Samsung are importing mobile devices that infringe its patented technologies for capacitive touch sensors. Thursday, those companies didn't comment. Neodron seeks a limited exclusion order and cease and desist orders banning importation and sale of infringing devices.

The International Trade Commission is investigating Rovi allegations of patent infringements involving various Comcast set-top boxes, broadband gateways and related hardware and software including remote controls and interactive program guides, it said Thursday. Comcast didn't comment Friday.

The Commerce Department Bureau of Industry and Security added five new national security-related technologies to the export administration regulations’ commerce control list, said a Thursday notice in the Federal Register. The additions stem from changes made to the Wassenaar Arrangement’s list of dual-use goods and technologies agreed to during a 2018 plenary meeting, BIS said. The changes add “recently developed or developing technologies” that are “essential” to U.S. national security: “discrete microwave transistors,” “continuity of operation software,” “post-quantum cryptography,” “underwater transducers designed to operate as hydrophones” and “air-launch platforms.” The changes took effect Thursday. Shipments “on dock for loading, on lighter, laden aboard an exporting carrier, or en route aboard a carrier” to a foreign destination on or before Thursday may proceed to the destination.

The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative launches a product exclusion process for the third tranche of tariffed Chinese goods "on or around June 30," the agency said in Tuesday's Federal Register. USTR requested OMB expedited approval for an information collection for the exclusion process that was announced as part of a May 10 tariff increase (see 1905070036).

The Trump administration's decision to examine emerging technologies as candidates for export controls could cost U.S. businesses tens of billions of dollars and threaten thousands of jobs, the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation reported, in an email Monday. If substantial export controls are enacted, ITIF said firms “could lose $14.1 billion to $56.3 billion in export sales over five years." The Commerce Department Bureau of Industry and Security seeks to expand export controls to technologies that are or may soon be essential to national security but aren't export-regulated. A Nov. 19 Federal Register notice sought feedback from companies on “identifying emerging technologies,” including products such as artificial intelligence and machine learning technology." ITIF warned of the harm that it said could result if Commerce defines “an overly restrictive set” of technologies, saying that could “significantly impede competitiveness of certain U.S. industries and stifle their “output, exports and employment growth.”

The U.S. and China “intend to continue further discussions,” said the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative in Friday's Federal Register. That notice proposed the 25 percent tariffs on $300 billion in Chinese goods not previously dutied. Requests to appear at hearings on the proposed duties are due June 10 in docket USTR–2019–0004 at regulations.gov, and written comments are due June 17, the same day the hearings are set to begin. Post-hearing rebuttal comments are due seven days after the hearings end. Presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping “have maintained contact through various means,” said a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson at a Beijing news conference Friday about media reports suggesting new U.S.-China trade talks were off the table for now.

U.S.-China trade talks “put Alibaba on the right side of all the issues on the table,” said Executive Vice Chairman Joseph Tsai on a fiscal Q4 earnings call Wednesday. Calling the trade war the big “elephant in the room,” Tsai spoke as if a comprehensive trade accord was already done. China’s “commitment to purchase more American products” means it will become a “net importing country,” reducing the U.S.-Chinese trade imbalance, he said. The Chinese e-commerce giant is "not concerned about slowing China exports affecting GDP growth because the Chinese economy is shifting from an export economy to a domestic consumption economy,” he said. "The middle class in China has reached critical mass of over 300 million, almost as large as the entire U.S. population," said Tsai. "The middle class will double in the next 10 years, especially from the lesser-developed Chinese cities. While total Chinese domestic consumption is $5.5 trillion today, consumption from these third-, fourth-, and fifth-tier cities, with a combined population of 500 million people, will triple from $2.3 trillion to nearly $7 trillion in the next 10 years." China in recent years also has made "significant improvements in reducing" intellectual-property theft, as it "moves closer to global norms in protecting and paying for foreign IP," he said. Any trade accord with the U.S. will help further that goal, he said. “The vexing issues in the trade negotiations will resolve themselves, as the Chinese economy is already evolving to close the gap between the interests of the United States and China.”

The Copyright Office Friday extended the deadline for comment to May 31 on a revised draft of its compendium's third edition, from Wednesday. The document provides “expert guidance” on CO institutional practices and related principles of law.

President Donald Trump’s administration making good at 12:01 a.m. Friday on his threat to hike the 10 percent tariffs on $200 billion in Chinese goods to 25 percent drew tech concern. “Raising tariff rates or imposing new tariffs on American families is not a winning negotiating tactic" with the Chinese, said CTA Friday. The tariff hike will raise the “significant toll” the trade war already has taken on U.S. businesses, workers, and consumers,” said Naomi Wilson, Information Technology Industry Council senior policy director-Asia. GoPro meanwhile remains "on track" to begin "ramping" up" U.S.-bound" action-camera production this quarter in Guadalajara, Mexico, as a proactive hedge against possible future tariffs on Chinese goods, said Chief Financial Officer Brian McGee on a Q1 call Thursday evening. GoPro has no current exposure to the three rounds of tariffs imposed since July but wanted protection anyway against new duties, he said. Guadalajara's production ramp will "support" U.S. sales beginning in Q3, said McGee. "We expect most of our U.S.-bound cameras will be in production in Mexico in the second half of 2019." GoPro's decision to shift production of most cameras destined for U.S. import from China to Mexico "supports our goal to insulate us against possible tariffs, as well as recognize some cost-saving and efficiencies," he said. The company says it's keeping production of non-U.S. cameras in China because it's an important strategic hub and the Chinese consumer market loves the product.

For Chinese goods already on their way to the U.S., 25 percent tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods that were to have taken effect at 12:01 a.m. Friday (see 1905060028), "the 10 percent duty rate will still apply," said Customs and Border Protection in updated "guidance" Thursday. That was in keeping with Office of the U.S. Trade Representative instructions a day earlier. CBP's new guidance was to correct the agency's errant system update tariffing all Chinese goods at 25 percent if they entered U.S. ports after 12:01 a.m. Friday, regardless of when they left China, in direct contradiction to USTR's instructions, blogged trade lawyer Paula Connelly Thursday. The discrepancy was likely causing "quite a bit of confusion," she said. USTR soon will publish the terms of this List 3 exclusion process, said Thursday's Federal Register notice making the tariff increase legally binding. U.S. importers “should move quickly to assess the impact" of the higher duty rate and "consider whether to prepare an exclusion request,” advised Covington & Burling Wednesday.