On January 12, 2021, the US Department of Commerce issued a final rule (the āFinal Ruleā) amending the Export Administration Regulations (āEARā) to implement recent licensing review policy changes for exports of US-origin unmanned aerial systems (āUASā), also known as ādrones.ā Our prior blog posts on UAS export policy developments are available here and here. The Final Rule implements the more flexible export license review policy applicable to a specific subset of UAS with maximum…
On July 24, 2020, the Trump Administration announced a new policy (the āUpdated UAS Policyā) on exports of US-origin unmanned aerial systems (āUASā), also known as ādrones.ā The Updated UAS Policy follows the Trump Administrationās UAS policy reforms announced in April 2018 (āApril 2018 UAS Export Policyā), which allowed exports of certain US-origin armed and unarmed UAS to occur via direct sales between US companies and foreign end users. Our previous blog post on the…
On April 19, the US Government issued a fact sheet outlining a new policy (the āNew UAS Policyā) on exports of US-origin unmanned aerial systems (āUASā) and a new National Security Presidential Memorandum (āNSPMā) updating the United States Conventional Arms Transfer Policy (the āNew CAT Policyā). These changes do not directly impact the export licensing requirements on UAS under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (āITARā) or the Export Administration Regulations (āEARā). However, according to statements made in a press briefing on these developments, the new policies reflect the Trump Administrationās interest in enabling US manufacturers of UAS to ālevel the playing fieldā and increase exports of these products to US allies and partners. They also evidence a broader effort to increase considerations of economic interests in arms transfer decisions.