General Counsel Forum 2009

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On October 21-22, 2009, general counsel from the world's leading high-tech companies met in San Francisco, for a unique opportunity to share information and network with peers, focusing on legal issues affecting the computing and IT industry.

BSA and event co-chairs David Nation, Bentley Systems, and Dan Carl, Sybase, welcomed 26 general counsel as well as industry experts, making it the highest attended General Counsel Forum held during the fall.

This exclusive, invitation-only event explored issues of antitrust policy and enforcement in light of the new administrations in the US and EU; the growing trend in mixed source development and its implications for high-tech companies' top legal officers; and consumer privacy issues in the wake of the explosion of new technologies.

Keynote Speakers

• Roberta Katz, Special Advisor for Technology to the Assistant Attorney General, Antitrust Division, US Department of Justice
• Philip K. Howard, Author, Life Without Lawyers and The Death of Common Sense
• Honorable David Kappos, Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office
  Newly-installed PTO Commissioner David Kappos closed the event with well-received keynote remarks. Kapppos discussed the ongoing challenges facing the Patent & Trademark Office, particularly with respect to staffing and the quality of patents being issued.

Panel Discussions

Antitrust: The Next Wave
Sponsored and Organized by Latham & Watkins
Moderator: Brad Smith, Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Corporate Secretary, Microsoft Corporation
Panelists:

• Pascal W. Di Fronzo, Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary, Autodesk, Inc.
• Richard A. Feinstein, Director, Bureau of Competition, Federal Trade Commission
• Dr. Philip Marsden, Director, Competition Law Forum and Senior Research Fellow, British Institute of International and Comparative Law
• Dan Wall, Partner, Chair of Global Antitrust and Competition Practice Group, Latham and Watkins LLP

Roberta Katz's keynote remarks set the stage for a lively discussion on current trends in antitrust enforcement and policy.  Moderated by Brad Smith of Microsoft, the panel discussed the heightened interest in antitrust issues displayed in recent months by policymakers on both sides of the Atlantic. Of particular interest were the institutional changes in governments in both the United States and Europe, with panelists noting that these new administrations appear ready to place greater antitrust scrutiny on high-tech companies than did their recent predecessors.

New Fronts in Intellectual Property: Mixed-Source Development and the High-Tech General Counsel
Panel Sponsored and Organized by Simpson Thacher & Bartlett
Moderator: Laura Fennell, Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary, Intuit Inc.
Panelists:

• Karen Cottle, Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary, Adobe Systems
• Michael Cunningham, Executive Vice President and General Counsel, Red Hat
• Jeff Ostrow, Partner, Chair of West Coast Intellectual Property Transactional, Practice, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP
• Timothy F. Taich, Vice President and General Counsel, Activant Solutions Inc.

This year's intellectual property (IP) discussion was particularly well-received, with Intuit's Laura Fennell leading a spirited conversation on the ways in which mixed source software development is impacting the IP marketplace. Panelists representing companies that develop commercial, open source, and mixed source products discussed the increasingly blurred lines between software development models, noting that both customers and developers today increasingly take a pragmatic view towards the development model underlying their software tools. The philosophical debate over whether open source software development is somehow "better" than commercial development is a thing of the past, panelists agreed, with governments, consumers and developers all focusing on achieving desired outcomes with whatever tools get the job done.

Just How Private? The New Front in Data Privacy
Panel Sponsored and Organized by O'Melveny and Myers
Moderator: Dan Cooperman, Senior Legal Advisor and Counsel, Apple Inc.
Panelists:

• Jim Dempsey, Vice President for Public Policy, Center for Democracy and Technology
• Tim Muris, Of Counsel, O'Melveny & Myers LLP, and Former Chairman, Federal Trade Commission
• Ted Ullyot, Vice President and General Counsel, Facebook, Inc.
• Nicole Wong, Deputy General Counsel, Google Inc.

Apple's Dan Cooperman led an energetic discussion on the current outlook for privacy policies, with a particular emphasis on the ways in which emerging technologies—most notably social networking tools—are impacting the consumer privacy landscape. While governments in both the United States and Europe have shown an increased willingness to regulate in this area, panelists saw attitudinal changes within the high tech industry itself—rather than any particular set of legislative developments —as the key driver of change in this area.

For more information, contact Pete Kaminskas at +1.202.266.2524 or peterk@bsa.org.