GES has extensive experience working on large and small export control, economic sanctions, and FCPA compliance reviews, investigations, and audits.  GES specializes in analyzing large, complex databases, such as enterprise resource planning (ERP) business systems, to identify potential export control and sanctions violations or risk areas.  Our analysts have also worked with many small and medium sized companies and their data.

GES works on military and dual use (ITAR and EAR) product classification for export control purposes, and the identification of product sales and technology transfers that may have required an export license.  GES export analysts have a superior level of experience conducting complex analytical work at fees significantly below those charged by attorneys.

Information analyzed in individual investigations includes data sets of tens of millions of lines for sanctioned country sales and transactions, classification reviews of tens of thousands of products at 30+ domestic and international facilities, in a wide variety of military and non-military categories.  Analysts have also conducted data reviews for smaller family-owned businesses in a highly efficient and cost effective way.  Understanding export control and sanctions issues is not possible without understanding the underlying facts and the scope of the issues.  Working on its own with raw company data, or working in collaboration with company IT and sales personnel, GES is expert at identifying issues under export control and sanctions provisions.  GES is particularly adept also at determining which transactions are not violations.

Our analysts have unsurpassed experience working on data reviews in response to government required investigations, company investigations as part of voluntary self disclosures (VSD), and as part of efficient, cost-effective internal audits.  One of the reasons for GES’s and Kelley Drye’s great success in handling internal investigations and voluntary self-disclosures to export enforcement agencies is the reliability and replicability the methodology used to analyze data.  Many enforcement personnel have experience with our approach, and we believe they trust the data they receive as a result of GES reviews.

GES also has extensive experience providing investigation support for FCPA reviews, internal investigations, and disclosures when required or advisable.  This includes analysis of certain financial data and conducting reviews of email and other correspondence, among other steps.

When appropriate, GES works in close collaboration with attorneys (including Kelley Drye attorneys) to assist with the protection of client confidentiality and attorney/client privilege, to the extent permitted by law.

Experience

GES has provided data analysis support for numerous VSDs, internal investigations, and audits involving exports, reexports, and transfers by a range of companies in multiple industries subject to various U.S. and international export control regulations.  Examples of GES’s experience include:

Global VSDs and BIS-mandated audits

  • 16 facility BIS-ordered voluntary self disclosure (VSD) follow-up audit. The analysis involved over 1.5 million lines of transactional data.  Key BIS personnel expressed repeated approval of the data analysis strategy, methodology, and audit implementation.
  • Analysis of over 17 million lines of export and reexport data involving billions of dollars of sales for a large manufacturing company in support of a VSD to various export control agencies.
  • Recently selected to provide BIS-ordered post-VSD audit services in four countries for a multinational materials manufacturer.

Sanctions investigations and compliance programs

  • Assisted with several internal investigations regarding circumvention of U.S. and E.U. sanctions laws by individuals within companies and by authorized distributors, including a review involving hundreds of thousands of transactions for indications of possible diversion.
  • Provide on-going compliance monitoring and quality assurance support for clients’ sanctions compliance programs, particularly in the financial sector.
  • Provide analytics support as part of voluntary and non-voluntary enforcement proceedings involving the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and other government agencies.
  • Support the development of clients’ internal processes to identify accounts held by parties subject to sanctions, particularly in the finance, e-commerce, and technology industries.
  • Provide data analytics support for OFAC and global sanctions risk assessments.
  • Assess the efficacy of new sanctions compliance screening programs for clients in the financial industry.

Pre/Post-acquisition due diligence and auditing

  • Provided data analysis for pre-acquisition export compliance due diligence on a significant number of small and large targets, including export control reviews of thousands to hundreds of thousands of line items.
  • Post-acquisition data analysis for audits of facilities in the U.S. and worldwide (Japan, Korea, China, India, the U.K., the Netherlands, Poland, etc.) for various industries, often involving several hundred thousand line items.

Compliance with SEC rules and inquiries:

  • Analysis of over 600,000 transactions by dozens of global affiliates of Fortune 100 company for over four years in response to inquiries from the SEC’s Office of Global Security Risk.
  • Analysis of transactions for compliance with reporting requirements under Section 13(r) of the Exchange Act for multiple clients.

Miscellaneous

  • Performed classification analyses under the EAR and ITAR for multiple clients involving millions of exported and reexported items.
  • Provided other audit and internal investigation support services, including transactional documentation reviews, licensing analyses, and extensive and small scope, quick turn-around email reviews.