Healthcare and life sciences are some of the largest and fastest-growing industries in the world, in addition to being the most regulated, with rapidly changing rules and regulations that often conflict from one country to another. Healthcare and life sciences companies face a number of challenges, including trying to understand how these laws impact their market and M&A strategies while contending with rising R&D costs, loss of patent protection of blockbuster drugs, pricing pressures, and competition from generics. Rapid convergence of the healthcare, life sciences and technology sectors requires even more legal expertise given the additional data privacy and intellectual property concerns.

Our expert team of healthcare and life sciences lawyers understand the challenges industry players face and what it takes to overcome them. As trusted advisors to established pharmaceutical, biotech, medical device and healthcare services companies, our team applies their expertise to help clients overcome legal and business challenges.

Our healthcare and life sciences lawyers work across borders as well as across practice areas to coordinate the protection of healthcare patents and brands, develop transfer pricing and tax planning strategies, and represent clients in product liability cases and complex disputes. We also advise on the legal and regulatory aspects of healthcare and life sciences advertising and marketing, clinical trials, competition and trade, commercial agreements, data privacy, employment issues and market entry.

Private equity’s fast-paced, competitive and innovative nature requires a law firm with the experience and expertise to meet complex demands on a global basis. From forming funds to structuring investments, adapting to regulations and addressing volatility in global and local markets, our in-depth knowledge of market trends and deep industry expertise helps investors secure the right deals with the right terms to minimize risk and build portfolio value.

With a highly-integrated team of 300 lawyers across more than 40 countries, our Private Equity Group brings truly global capabilities and exceptional insight to financial investors wherever their business takes them. We are a trusted partner throughout the investment process, including:

· Fund formation

· Acquisitions, add-ons, refinancings

· Portfolio company management and restructuring

· Exits

Working across industries and practice areas including tax, finance, intellectual property, M&A and employment, our lawyers provide commercially-minded advice, understand client needs and employ a multi-disciplinary approach to provide private equity clients with comprehensive legal advice.

Chambers Global recognizes our group for its expertise as well as our cross-border capability, consistent quality, and strong client service. Our team has been recommended by leading dealmakers for our private equity work in major financial centers and emerging markets.

The companies of today are focused on the technology of tomorrow and continuous innovation is essential if organizations want to take full advantage of new opportunities, making it crucial for companies to become more efficient and creative in how they develop, source, and use technology.

We appreciate the challenges of staying innovative and profitable and are used to working cross-border to leverage local market knowledge, delivering real value in the process whereby our clients rely on our ability to leverage the synergies and understand the business and world they operate in and to achieve quick and efficient results within our extensive client base which includes software publishers, SaaS, IaaS and PaaS providers, IT security companies, hardware manufacturers, as well as their customers..

We pride ourselves on being able to integrate and configure the firm’s extensive regulatory and policy and transactional and litigation expertise to meet the specialized needs of clients across the sub-sectors of TMT, whilst providing specialist knowledge and to assist clients with their strategic transactions and critical legal issues on a national and international scale. We have also used our significant industry experience to design innovative compliance programs and new structures for your technology offerings.

Our lawyers have advised clients on a broad range of media projects, including television, film production and finance, international co-productions, VR and AR projects, Esports, online content, as well as some of the most prominent print media. Our expertise covers both regulatory and technical aspects, having advised operators of digital platforms, broadcast, multicast as well as unicast systems.

We assist multinationals, start-ups, and public sector clients with corporate matters, commercial contracts, IP aspects, questions relating to privacy or cybersecurity, as well as complex transactions and disputes.

We assist clients in all stages of a start-up’s lifecycle, from incorporation, hiring of key employees, creating an ESOP, through Pre-Seed, Seed, and Series A/B/C/D financing rounds to exit. By bringing in-depth business and finance sense, solid advisory expertise and a wealth of industry knowledge to the table, we are well-placed to advise all players across the start-up ecosystem, be they founders, start-ups, angel investors, incubators and accelerators, or venture capital funds.

Our expertise also includes creating international holding structures and assisting with international expansion through market entry or acquisitions. Our advisors have worked with world class start-ups from early stage, going through a successful IPO or completing a high value trade sale. We also advise on setting up and investing in venture capital funds, and assist funds with structuring and negotiating as well as exiting their investments.

Although the global market has become increasingly open to trade, disparate local laws and varied business and cultural practices can make creating, distributing and selling goods and services in certain markets a major challenge. International trade sanctions limit how companies can do business, as well as customs laws, exchange controls and foreign investment requirements.

We help clients overcome these challenges and successfully compete in the world’s developed and emerging markets. We advise businesses on sourcing, manufacturing, distributing and selling their products and services around the world. We also help clients select, monitor and manage their relationships with the third-party suppliers, manufacturers, distributors and sales agents in their supply chains.

Well-versed in WTO, regulatory and commercial law, we advise companies on compliance issues such as anti-corruption, anti-bribery, trade sanctions and export and import controls, as well as commercial contracts, product labelling requirements, product liability and recalls, and sales promotion and marketing rules across multiple countries. No matter the issue, we focus on simplifying complex trade requirements so our clients can focus on growing their businesses.

We offer legal certainty in a free market and together with our network of specialists, we provide solutions for pricing strategy, conflict resolution, and dealing with tax authorities and global regulatory services.

We advise clients active at the forefront of the automotive sector, thereby providing an integrated service to clients across the industry. Currently, the industry is going through some fundamental changes, whereby the opportunities are exceptional, but there are also challenges. We provide cutting-edge advice to the automotive sector in the view that long-term success is about more than developing technology – it’s also about finding the right path through the legislative landscape, which is filled with challenges our lawyers knowhow to circumnavigate.

New materials, technologies and production methods are revolutionising manufacturing. Entire industries are undergoing waves of consolidation while new collaborations are being formed as businesses search for innovation. Our lawyers have advise leading industrial groups on business-critical issues, helping them execute complex transactions, strategically manage and defend their intellectual property, navigate regulation and deal with cross-border risks and crises.Our clients include local and global groups active in very diverse fields, often with an environmentally conscious mission, including leading businesses in alimentation, industry, automotive manufacturers, chemicals producers, conglomerates and trading houses.

Having acted for the real estate industry’s leading players, our lawyers advise on the full range of real estate-related transactions. With an integrated network of expert individuals, we handle the entire property ‘life-cycle’ from the initial acquisition, development, leasing, joint venturing and financing through to the final exit.
Our coordinated approach and partnerships across the board means that we can support any real estate project, including:

• Construction
• Environment
• Hospitality
• Real Estate Development
• Real Estate Finance
• Real Estate Funds
• Real Estate Litigation
• Real Estate Private Equity & Investment
• Real Estate Securitisation
• Real Estate Tax

Our lawyers have served as trusted advisors to the leading insurers and reinsurers on a range of matters such as complex transactions, disputes, financing, regulatory and commercial matters. Our integrated cross-practice team includes experienced lawyers from across our corporate and M&A, regulatory, banking & finance, dispute resolution, antitrust, tax, IT/IP pensions and employment teams.
We can offer insurance companies support across the full range of their legal needs, including on:

• Large cross-border M&A transactions
• Complex reorganisation and restructuring
• Global and local market regulatory enforcement
• Major insurance/reinsurance disputes
• Distribution, outsourcing and other commercial contracts

Many of our lawyers have excellent industry knowledge and relevant expertise in dealing with the legal and commercial issues faced in retail by multinationals as well as smaller retailers and suppliers. We provide advice to many businesses on the implementation of strategic projects such as M&A and expansion into new markets, in addition to operational and day to day issues affecting their businesses across the nation and the globe.
Consumer goods, including luxury goods, knows an increasing interest from strategic investors in well-known European brands and the increasing trend for luxury goods companies established in mature markets looking towards the emerging markets for new opportunities to counter the impact of the low-growth environment in their home jurisdictions poses several legal challenges. We assist clients whether they are looking to expand into new markets or partner with foreign investors. Our lawyers are all experienced in dealing with the legal and commercial issues faced by multinationals and also smaller retailers as well as commercial and luxury goods manufacturers and suppliers.

Our lawyers offer our clients first class advice based on in-depth legal expertise and an knowledge of the industry, their company and the distinctive commercial drivers that affect them. We have a fundamental understanding of the continually changing business environment and the commercial, competitive and compliance pressures that the consumer goods & retail sector is facing. We support our clients in this sector in all key areas of their business, from strategic growth and divestments to international brand management, commercial relationships and regulatory compliance.
Our experience includes advising on:

• mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures and strategic alliances
• ongoing commercial relationships
• economic regulations
• multi-jurisdictional and domestic competition/antitrust issues
• international brand management & IP issues
• franchising and licensing arrangements
• consumer finance, such as credit sale, outsourcing, store-cards and credit cards
• information technology procurement, ecommerce and home shopping arrangements
• logistics, distribution, packaging, manufacturing and transitional service arrangements
• domestic and international product liability and safety issues affecting manufacturers, importers and retailers
• corporate law and corporate governance
• real estate matters
• the full range of financing arrangements, securitisation structures, hedging and derivatives and management of counter-party risk
• dispute resolution solutions, often in the context of ongoing commercial relationships
• tax, share schemes, employment and pensions requirements
• environmental issues arising at all stages of the product life-cycle
• public policy.