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Nicole Simonian

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Nicole Janigian Simonian is the co-chair of the firm’s International Trade practice and International Employment and Global Mobility Lead, with a focus on the firm’s Asia practice. A partner in the firm’s Los Angeles office, she is also a director of the firm’s China office in Shanghai. Nicole’s practice covers a range of international compliance and regulatory issues, including cross border transactions, international trade, global mobility and employment, and global supply chains.

Nicole is a member of the firm’s COVID‐19 Working Group, focusing on advising employers on compliance with U.S. and international initiatives affecting private employers and providing guidance on how to navigate the myriad of regulatory complexities companies are confronted with on a global basis.

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On October 13, President Biden issued a Fact Sheet entitled Biden Administration Efforts to Address Bottlenecks at Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, Moving Goods from Ship to Shelf to help address the “delays and congestion” across the transportation supply chain. As has been widely reported in recent weeks and months, the global supply chain has been hard hit by large increases in e-commerce and delays and shutdowns implemented to curb the spread of COVID-19. The release confirms public and private commitments to move goods more quickly and to secure the resiliency of American and global supply chains. To do so, the Biden Administration is focusing on the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, which act as the ports of entry to the United States for 40% of containers received. The President, together with leadership from these ports, are undertaking a series of public and private commitments as noted below.
Continue Reading Biden Administration Works with Industry Stakeholders to Address Supply Chain Delays at the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach

On August 20, 2021, China’s national legislature passed the Personal Information Protection Law (“PIPL”), which will become effective on November 1, 2021. As China’s first comprehensive system for protecting personal information, the PIPL is an extension of the personal information and privacy rights enshrined in China’s Civil Code, and also a crucial element of a set of recent laws in China that seek to strengthen data security and privacy. Among other things, the PIPL sets out general rules for processing and cross-border transfer of personal information. A number of provisions, notably various obligations imposed on data processors, restrictions on cross-border transfer, and hefty fines, will have significant impact on multinational corporations’ HR activities, including recruitment, performance monitoring, cross-border transfers, compliance investigations, termination of employment relationships, and background checks.

This alert will highlight specifically how the PIPL will apply to workplace scenarios in China and provide suggestions to help ensure data privacy compliance for multinational corporations’ China labor and employment operations.

Employee Consent and Exceptions to Consent

Under Article 4 of the PIPL, “personal information” is defined broadly as information related to natural persons recorded electronically or by other means that has been used or can be used to identify such natural persons, excluding information that has been anonymized. Specific types of personal information have been noted for additional protection under Article 28 of the PIPL as “sensitive personal information”. Sensitive personal information is defined under the law as personal information that is likely to result in damage to the personal dignity, physical wellbeing or property of any natural person, and includes, among others, information such as biometric identification, religious belief, special identity, medical health, financial account, physical location tracking and whereabouts, and personal information of those under the age of 14.
Continue Reading Employee Personal Information Protection in China – Are You Up to Speed?

The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) came into force on July 1, 2020. Included in the USMCA are stronger labor provisions Congressional Democrats demanded, with the support of the Trump Administration, that were approved on a bipartisan basis during consideration of the USMCA implementing legislation in late 2019. The stronger labor provisions helped secure the support…

Global Trade Talks is a podcast that shares brief perspectives on key global issues on international trade, current events, business, law and public policy as they impact our lives.

In the latest episode, hosts Nicole Simonian and Ambassador Robert Holleyman interview Fred Hochberg, former Chairman and President of the Export-Import Bank of the United States. …

The new United States Mexico Canada Agreement (USMCA), which replaced the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), became effective on July 1, 2020. Historically, free trade agreements like the NAFTA have been criticized for their lack of strong labor provisions to address low wages and inadequate labor standards that advocates argue support worker rights and improve economic growth in developing countries. The USMCA seeks to address those concerns. In fact, as a precondition to the passage of the USMCA, the U.S. Congress reopened the negotiations at the end of 2019 and amended the agreement to bolster Mexican workers’ rights and to include stronger enforcement provisions like the Rapid Response Mechanism to hold companies in Mexico accountable for violating the rights of free association and collective bargaining.

What is the Rapid Response Mechanism?

The Rapid Response Mechanism is perhaps the most novel aspect of the labor provisions of the USMCA. It applies between the U.S. and Mexico, and between Canada and Mexico, but not between the U.S. and Canada. Within the U.S., the Rapid Response Mechanism can be triggered when any person in the U.S. files a petition claiming the “denial of rights” at a “covered facility” in a “priority sector” in Mexico to the Interagency Labor Committee for Monitoring and Enforcement (“Interagency Labor Committee”), co-chaired by the U.S. Trade Representative and the Secretary of Labor. The Interagency Labor Committee can request that Mexico conduct a review to determine whether there is indeed a denial of rights, or. If Mexico does not agree to conduct a review, the Interagency Labor Committee may request a panel to be convened to conduct its own verification under the USMCA.Continue Reading Labor Provisions of the USMCA: What Multinational Employers Should Know

On March 15, New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio announced his intention to sign an executive order requiring restaurants and bars to limit services to take out and delivery orders.  Similar operational limits are also in place in other jurisdictions around the country, with several more sure to come.  Retailers such as Apple, Nike,…

Want to learn more? Visit Crowell &Moring’s Coronavirus Resource Center.

The World Health Organization, on March 11, 2020, officially declared the spread of COVID-19 a pandemic. By now, most multinational companies have already been grappling with the effects of the coronavirus and are considering the steps they should be taking…

When selling and sourcing from China, companies should closely track any fapiaos issued from its Chinese subsidiaries and obtained from Chinese vendors, as missing, falsified, or fake fapiaos can carry significant potential civil and criminal penalties.

Anyone who has travelled to China will have encountered little pieces of paper called “fapiao” that act…

As concern about coronavirus – the upper-respiratory infection that was first diagnosed in humans in Wuhan, China in late 2019, and has spread to the United States in recent days – grows worldwide, employers face a series of questions regarding the impact the virus will have on the workplace.

What Must Employers Do to Maintain…

Our retail multinational clients often ask if there is an effective way of protecting intellectual property rights (“IPR”) in China. While traditional enforcement remedies in China have been ineffective in the past, customs border protection schemes in recent years have provided a cost effective tool to protect the IPR of brand owners in the retail…