‘What to know’ – negotiating cross-border commercial contracts and sales and distribution arrangements

Caroline Berube is the Managing Partner of HJM Asia Law (with offices in China and Singapore). She is admitted to the New York Bar, the Singapore Bar, holds a BCL (civil law) and an LL.B. (common law) from McGill University in Montreal and studied Chinese law at the National University of Singapore. Caroline has been working in Asia for more than 22 years with SMEs, MNCs and foreign banks, advising them in the field of commercial law, intellectual property, human resources and M&A in the Asia Pacific region. With an extensive presence on the ground in Asia, Caroline is well versed in the opportunities and risks associated with most Asian jurisdictions.

Over the course of a thirty-year career as a lawyer, I have mainly specialised in giving legal advice to companies regarding both national and international activities. On one hand, I have focused on negotiating and drafting partnership agreements –from all kinds of commercial and simple joint venture agreements to merger and acquisition operations at an international level as well as accompanying manufacturing and commercial companies in the development of subsidiary companies in various jurisdictions. I also have experience in the prevention and resolution of conflicts derived from the aforementioned agreements. A significant part of my professional career has been devoted to the resolution of disputes arising from business relations with third parties and between partners and shareholders themselves, in national and international proceedings, both before Spanish and foreign arbitration bodies and courts. Finally, I regularly take on cases which involve the negotiation and drafting of contracts in the construction and engineering sector as well as real estate deals within the hotel industry. I am a member of the International Bar Association (IBA), the International Business Law Consortium (IBLC), the Associazione Internazionale di Giuristi di Lingua Italiana (AIGLI), and the Catalan Experts Association for Inheritance Rights –a topic on which I have lectured and spoken in conferences and congresses aimed at lawyers at the Il.lustre Col.legi d’Advocats de Barcelona (the Barcelona Bar Association)–. Furthermore, I am also a member of the International Academy of Trial Lawyers (IATL), a group of elite trial lawyers from more than 30 countries representing prosecutors and defence lawyers in criminal cases, and plaintiffs and defence counsels in civil proceedings.

Member of the Paris Bar since 1997, Stephane graduated in Paris and the UK. Stephane heads CMG LEGAL’s Foreign Investment Department, focusing especially on areas such as corporate immigration and regulatory matters incl. ICT/TMT/Data matters.

Hideaki Roy Umetsu is a partner at Mori Hamada & Matsumoto. He focuses on international and domestic M&A transactions, global compliance matters, including anti-corruption complaince, internal investigation, or corporate govenance for oversea subsidiaries. He also gives advice on export controls and other trade-related matters. He was admitted to the bars in Japan (2004) and New York (2010). Umetsu was educated at the University of Tokyo (LL.B., 2003) and the University of Chicago Law School (LL.M., 2009). From 2006 to 2007, he worked as an associate director at the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry of Japan, and he also worked as a foreign associate at Davis Polk & Wardwell from 2009 to 2010.