Foreign Ownership, Control, or Influence (FOCI): Keep Your Business Government Compliant

The Turner Center for Entrepreneurship and Illinois APEX Accelerator at Bradley University is offering this webinar at no cost to participants to help you keep YOUR business government compliant. From investors to employees to customers, there are a lot of people who can influence your business. Most of the time these relationships improve your business, but sometimes these influences can increase risk for your company. In this session we’ll be discussing risks posed by foreign ownership, control, or influence (FOCI). A company can be subject to FOCI in various ways and FOCI can have a wide range of consequences. FOCI can affect your ability to obtain government contracts, lead to a loss of key personnel, or provide a vector for unwanted technology transfer. This session will cover the basics of understanding FOCI and how to begin to address FOCI risks. Speaker: Dr. Bryson Reynolds is the Associate Director for Small Business Risk in the Department of Defense’s Office of Small Business Programs (OSBP). Dr. Reynolds oversees efforts to address foreign, ownership, control, and influence (FOCI) risk to small businesses in the defense industrial base, and to expand market intelligence tools through the Market Research Center of Excellence (MRCOE). Prior to joining DoD OSBP, Dr. Reynolds worked in neuroscience research at the University of Virginia and Vanderbilt University and in STEM education at the Vanderbilt Center for Science Outreach.