Experts from Kharon, Akin Gump, and Hoover Institution discuss the research security and export control challenges facing universities and best practices for enhancing controls. This webinar highlights the vital importance of compliance in navigating the challenges of global collaboration while ensuring the protection of critical research.
In September 2024, the Majority Staff of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party released a report entitled CCP on the Quad: How American Taxpayers and Universities Fund the CCP’s Advanced Military and Technological Research. The report highlighted three joint U.S.-China research institutes that created “a sophisticated mechanism for transferring research and technologies and the expertise that undergirds both to the PRC.”
University research security and export control officers face the challenge of ensuring that Department of Defense-funded research remains safeguarded from foreign exploitation and influence while maintaining productive and collaborative research relationships with international partners.
As many U.S. universities reevaluate their international partnerships as regulatory expectations evolve, the need for mature and sophisticated compliance programs has never been greater.
Speakers:
Ethan Woolley, Director, Kharon
Ethan Woolley is a Director at Kharon, where he leads the firm’s work with research institutions and universities in North America. Ethan regularly speaks at conferences and industry events on sanctions, research security, and export control risks. Ethan received his BA in International Relations and Russian from the University of Pennsylvania and an MA in Energy Politics from the European University at St. Petersburg. Ethan speaks Russian and spent time living in Moscow.
Kevin Wolf, Partner, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP
Kevin Wolf has more than 30 years’ experience providing advice and counseling regarding the laws, regulations, policies, practices and politics pertaining to export controls, sanctions, national security reviews of foreign direct investments and other international trade issues. Kevin also has deep experience that includes civil and criminal defense, internal investigations, due diligence audits and compliance program enhancements, as well as being a Special Compliance Officer. His practice focuses on Export Administration Regulations (EAR), International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), and regulations administered by the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS).
Mr. Wolf previously served as Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Export Administration (2010- 2017) with the Bureau of Industry and Security, where he developed and implemented policies pertaining to export administration issues, particularly the licensing requirements of EAR.
Glenn Tiffert, Distinguished Research Fellow, Hoover Institution
Glenn Tiffert is a distinguished research fellow at the Hoover Institution and a historian of modern China. He co-chairs Hoover’s program on the US, China, and the World, and also leads Stanford’s participation in the National Science Foundation’s SECURE program, a $67 million effort authorized by the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022 to enhance the security and integrity of the US research enterprise.
Glenn works closely with government and civil society partners around the world to document and build resilience against authoritarian interference with democratic institutions. He works extensively on the security and integrity of ecosystems of knowledge, particularly academic, corporate, and government research; science and technology policy; and malign foreign influence.
A specialist on the political and legal history of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), his academic scholarship includes publications in English and Chinese on the origins of the modern Chinese court system and judiciary, the drafting of the PRC Constitution, and the Chinese Communist Party’s efforts to globalize its censorship regime and rewrite its turbulent past. He earned his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley.