The vendors effectively helped defraud Netflix. If Kail initiated the scheme, demanding kickbacks for deals to move forward (as seems likely to be the case given the number of vendors involved) they're unlikely to face consequences, but they're morally culpable regardless.

It is not unlawful to offer incentives to the company itself in order for them to make a deal. In fact, that's effectively how most deals close (the incentive is usually simply monetary and takes the form of a discount). The problem here is that Kail abused his position as an agent of Netflix to profit at their expense.

This is exactly why I'm confused. I would also like this clarified.

His jobs at Netflix is to get the best deal for Netflix, not to get the deal that nets him the most money from the vendor. The vendor paying him is increasing the costs to the vendor, therefore presumably increasing the costs they will pass on to Netflix.

The problem there is the money comes first. In the case of former regulators, by the time they are hired by the drug company they're no longer a regulator. It's not clear the drug company has anything to gain from hiring them. Yes it's grubby, but it's hard to prove anything. If the money comes up front, that's easy to prove.

Yes, it obviously is illegal. He was just convicted of fraud.

If they're hiring as a consultant the procurement officer at Netflix that decides to grant them the contract (and Netflix doesn't know about/approve this arrangement), that seems _very_ transparently to be a kickback to me.

> it's hard to prove that what they did was illegal.

Sure, it's a lot of work. That's why we spend money on prosecutors. But they literally _just_ proved that in a way that convinced 12 people "beyond a reasonable doubt", so it's certainly not impossible.

It just seems weird to be asking: "is the described scheme illegal?" in an article describing a conviction for the described behavior, unless you're questioning the validity of the judicial process in this case (which itself is a fine thing to do)

The words you are looking for are 'conflict of interest'. If you are acting on behalf of a corporation and you have such a conflict of interest you are required to disclose it.

Maybe, instead of hiring a single person, you should hire Netflix itself. Netflix itself surely knows a lot about the kinds of companies that do business with Netflix.

Let Netflix worry about compensating the people who are doing the work.

Its definitely against standard contractual terms (i.e conflicts of interest terms) and here they would all probably come under fraud in the inducement; i.e Kail induced Netflix to enter into contractual terms based on misrepresentations of what Netflix was gaining when it signed the contract (leaving out his personal gain which absolutely would be a material benefit that netflix itself could have gained had it known those terms existed).