Want some early evidence of the effect of the Justice Department FCPA Pilot Program? Read nothing more than this letter send out by FCPA Unit head Daniel Kahn to both Akamai Technologies, Inc. and Nortek Inc. this week, declining to prosecute both companies. (Nortek received a similar letter.)
Kahn wrote, “Based upon the information known to the Department at this time, we have closed our inquiry into this matter. Consistent with the FCPA Pilot Program, we have reached this conclusion despite the bribery by an employee of the Company’s subsidiary in China and one of that subsidiary’s channel partners, based on a number of factors, including but not limited to Akamai’s prompt voluntary self-disclosure of the misconduct, the thorough investigation and fulsome cooperation by the Company (including by identifying all individuals involved in or responsible for the misconduct and by providing all facts relating to that misconduct to the Department) and its agreement to continue to cooperate in any ongoing investigations of individuals, the steps that the Company has taken to enhance its compliance program and its internal accounting controls, the Company’s full remediation (including promptly suspending at the start of the investigation the individual involved in the China misconduct who then resigned shortly thereafter, terminating the relationship with the channel partner involved in the misconduct, and disciplining five other employees who should have prevented other violations of the Company’s policies), and the fact that Akamai will be disgorging to the SEC the full amount of disgorgement as determined by the SEC.”
