Software piracy is a global industry worth more than £34 billion. Now a Welsh legal firm is teaming up with the academic sector in this country to develop the skills required to fight back.
CJCH is a Welsh business of over 140 employees, with offices in London and Bristol, but the firm’s Cardiff headquarters is the centre of its anti-piracy operations, and the platform for its partnerships with academia in Wales to give students here the intellectual property skills to tackle software piracy across the world.
This growth in ‘law tech’ follows Welsh Government support for the cyber sector in Wales, where Cyber Wales has become a key global hub in the field of cyber security and is a Founding Member of GlobalEPIC – the Global Ecosystem of ecosystems for Partnership and Innovation in Cyber, which includes 27 Cyber Clusters in 18 countries across 6 continents.
CJCH is planning to relaunch their immersive Investigator Development Course (IDC) with the University of SouthWales (USW), following a successful pilot last year, equipping students with a combination of theoretical learning, classroom training and cutting-edge simulations provided by USW’s Hydra Simulation Centre, used by the police and other agencies for specialist scenario-based teaching.
CJCH Group Chairman and Senior Partner Stephen Clarke said: “We’re bringing together the industry, investigation and evidence gathering skills of a global licence compliance and enforcement consulting firm, with the best practice of a Welsh university to create a skilled software and anti-piracy team who can help companies recover lost IP revenue anywhere in the world – a massive issue.”
This collaboration follows the recent Commission on Justice in Wales Report which seeks a greater focus in Wales on law tech, which is seen as crucial to the success of the legal professions here in a sector that is important to the Welsh economy as we look to increase the export of our legal services.
Offering technology-based services, CJCH operates throughout the world, with a client roster that includes Dassault Systèmes, a multibillion-pound software company based in France.
CJCH already enjoys a long-term relationship with Cardiff University, recruiting the majority of their entry level consulting staff from its highly capable graduates. Last year the firm partnered with the South Wales Cyber Cluster to host the IP Protection conference of international speakers, and aims to host its own software anti-piracy and licence compliance event in London next year.
Aston Martin has located its Global Cyber Security team at Bro Tathan, and the Endeavr Wales funding scheme is driven by Welsh Government and Airbus to help fund the development of early stage research to the point where commercial value can be realised.
Cyber Wales’ ecosystem comprises four core sectors – business, academia, government and cyber defense. Wales leads the way in cyber education with initiatives such as the National Cyber Security Academy at the University of South Wales, the Centre of Excellence in Cyber Security Analytics at Cardiff University and the Cyber Threats Intelligence Centre at Swansea University.
Next year Wales will host CyberUK, the UK Government’s flagship cyber security event, an opportunity for Welsh Government to reinforce the message that Wales is a hub for cyber security in the UK.
