Our Commitments to Our Customers and Business Partners
Our customers and business partners are essential to our
success, and we are dedicated to preserving the trust they have placed in us. We
must treat our customers and business partners with fairness and respect at all
times. As such, we endeavor to always deal fairly, to compete ethically and to
carefully protect our business partners’ confidential information.
Dealing Fairly
As a new organization, we must compete vigorously in order
to gain a strong foothold in the marketplace. However, at no time may our
competitive methods be anything other than ethical and lawful. This requires
that we be truthful and honest when interacting with others on Tracking
Innovations’ behalf.
In particular, our marketing and sales practices must always
be fair. This means we may not misrepresent the quality, features or
availability of our products and services. In addition, we may never make
statements about our competitors’ products or services that are false or
misleading, or make comparisons that are unfair or unsupported.
Dealing fairly also means we keep our word to our customers,
vendors and other business partners and fulfill all contracts according to
their exact specifications. We always use honorable means to meet and exceed
these parties’ reasonable expectations. In the same spirit, we do not take on
work that we are unable to fulfill. At all times, we strive to establish our
Company’s reputation in the marketplace as an organization that is fully
committed to doing business with integrity.
Following Competition Laws
We are striving to become key players in the global
marketplace. As such, we must strictly follow free market rules, which ensure
that only objective factors (such as quality and price) determine who succeeds
and who fails. In short, this means we may never violate applicable competition
laws, which include U.S. antitrust laws and competition laws in effect in the
other countries where we do business.
Competition laws prohibit us from entering into discussions
with our competitors regarding fixing prices, allocating markets, dividing
customers or otherwise restricting competition. In addition, we may not enter
into formal or informal agreements with customers, vendors or other business
partners that may limit competition, such as agreements to tie products, fix
resale prices or refuse to sell to particular customers or buy from particular
vendors.
We must always exercise particular caution when attending
industry association meetings, as conversing with competitors carries a risk of
violating competition laws. These meetings provide excellent opportunities for
networking and business development, but you should be careful to avoid both
formal and informal discussions regarding prices, discounts, boycotts, terms
and conditions of sale, standardization of terms, warranties or product
specifications. If any of these topics arise, you should stop the conversation
immediately and report the situation to our CIO.
Gathering Competitive Information
To compete effectively, we must know what our competitors
are doing. Although it is certainly appropriate to gather competitive
information, we must always make sure we do so ethically and legally. Generally
speaking, we may gather and use competitive information that is publicly
available, including information from newspaper or magazine articles, corporate
financial reports and non-confidential proposal information. However, it is
inappropriate to use inadvertently disclosed confidential information or
competitive bid information. In addition, it is unethical and oftentimes
illegal to seek to obtain such information. If you possess competitor
information that you believe was sent to you inadvertently or was obtained in
an unethical or illegal manner, contact our CIO immediately.
Always be cautious when requesting competitive information
from a fellow associate about a prior employer. Confidential information about
prior employers should stay confidential even after that employment relationship
ends.
Keeping Customer and Third-Party Information Secure
We are also responsible for protecting confidential
information belonging to our customers, vendors and other business partners
that we acquire through the work we do on behalf of Tracking Innovations. We
must never disclose this information to unauthorized persons, even after our
employment with our Company ends.
In addition, we must respect all intellectual property
belonging to others, including information relating to software licenses and publications.
When an invention, product, idea, written work, logo or name is owned by
another company or an individual, we may only use that property if we have
obtained prior express permission from its owner.
If you have any questions regarding your responsibility to
protect third-party confidential information, please consult our CIO.