Chinese pirates clone NEC

CHINESE IT pirates seem to be getting a bit ambitious. The latest trick is not just to copy a company's technology, but to steal the entire operation.

Apparently in China one bunch cloned the technology mega-outfit NEC. It set up pirated NEC factories and warehouses and offices and produced knock off NEC pirated goods.

NEC wondered what was happening to its Chinese operations and hired detectives to find out. Two years later the real NEC, along with Inspector Knacker of the Beijing yard, swooped on the factories and shut them down.

Evidence seized in raids on 18 factories and warehouses in China and Taiwan over the past year showed that the counterfeiters had set up what amounted to a parallel NEC brand. They had even networked partnerships with more than 50 electronics factories in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

So it says, here. µ