The largest Czech-Slovak law firm HAVEL & PARTNERS, so far with offices in Prague, Brno, Ostrava and Bratislava, will open a new office in Olomouc. It will offer in particular financial institution retail claim administration services, i.e. namely conducting trial, insolvency and inheritance proceedings. At the same time, it will serve as one of the three main contact points of HAVEL & PARTNERS in Moravia. Cash Collectors, a partner collection agency, also envisages the same move. Together, the two firms are planning to open dozens of new positions.
“At the moment, selection procedures are under way to fill in student, junior associate and administrative support vacancies. We are planning to have a team of about ten in the first year that we expect to double next year,” Jaroslav Havel, managing partner at HAVEL & PARTNERS, comments on the new staffing. The persons in change of the office will be Ludvík Juřička, Marek Vojáček and Jaroslav Havel; the Cash Collectors office will be headed by Oliver Uraz.
The new employees and other team members should be recruited among students and graduates of the Olomouc Faculty of Law, which the law firm is closely connected with thanks to Milan Hulmák, Filip Melzer, Petr Tégl and Renáta Šínová, who are faculty lecturers and teachers while at the same time being counsels at HAVEL & PARTNERS and the main lecturers in the HAVEL & PARTNERS ACADEMY. “There are a number of promising future lawyers studying at the Olomouc Faculty of Law, and we would like to help them get a head start in their careers in the firm that is at the top in its field,” adds Jaroslav Havel.
Law firm HAVEL & PARTNERS rendered advisory to dm drogerie markt s.r.o., a successful multinational chain doing business in the Czech and Slovak markets, on the launch of an e-shop in the Czech Republic. The company is the leader in the Czech drugstore market, and the advisory practically concerned the entire e-commerce project, namely:
The team working on the project was led by Ivan Rámeš, a partner of HAVEL & PARTNERS, and consisted namely of Radek Riedl, an associate, and other legal experts (Ján Jaroš, Lukáš Jakoubek and Eliška Toušková).
As a top tier specialised law firm in the Czech Republic, HAVEL & PARTNERS s.r.o. is pleased to have been selected to contribute to the Dual Citizenship Report.
The Dual Citizenship Report is a definitive guide to Dual Citizenship based on the legislation different in the numerous countries throughout the European Region through a collaboration of over 30+ European Law firms. The report was compiled and edited by our Maltese partners, Chetchuti Cauchi Advocates and can be found on the http://www.dualcitizenshipreport.org/, which offers the report on an interactive platform, making it more widely accessible.
Our firm has contributed to the Czech and Slovak Republics chapters, where we outlined the most recent developments in the legislation on the different ways of acquiring citizenship in our jurisdiction as well as the possibility or lack thereof of holding dual citizenship.
We are pleased to form part of this comprehensive legal analysis and we look forward to further contributions and updates.
(CJEU rules against investment arbitrations based on intra-EU bilateral investment treaties)
Law firm HAVEL & PARTNERS (until 31 December 2017 bearing the name of Havel, Holásek & Partners) has been acknowledged in the prestigious competition law GCR 100 edition issued by the UK’s Global Competition Review (GCR). In the GCR 100 publication summarising the results for 2017 (18th Edition), the firm ranks among the Czech Republic’s leaders in the field of competition law and economics with the supreme Elite rating and among Highly Recommended advisors in the same field in Slovakia. Simultaneously, Robert Neruda, a partner and the leader of the team of competition lawyers and economists at HAVEL & PARTNERS, was listed among the most influential global leaders and specialists in the area of competition law and economics – Who’s Who Legal: Thought Leaders – Competition 2018.
“Our firm boasts one of the largest, most experienced and most dynamically growing teams of competition lawyers and economists in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Being listed in the prestigious publication GCR 100 is a major success for us, which we appreciate even more so because we have been awarded the Elite and the Highly Recommended rating for the Czech Republic and Slovakia, respectively, for the third time in a row. That confirms our clients’ appreciation for the comprehensive services we provide to them and our solutions on complex competition protection and regulatory issues,” says Robert Neruda, a partner and the leader of the team of experts in this sector.
In HAVEL & PARTNERS, there are 15 experts on competition law and now also competition economics. Their experience in private as well as public sectors enables them to have an overall understanding of institutions, procedures and policies within the EU. Apart from Robert Neruda, who himself is the former vice-chairman of the Office for the Protection of Competition, there is also Milan Brouček, the former chief economist of the Czech and Slovak anti-monopoly offices and the long-term economic expert of the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Competition. Since 2016, the firm has managed to quite uniquely blend top legal and competition-related economic advisory and provide it in a single service package.
Other competition law awards
The largest Czech-Slovak law firm HAVEL & PARTNERS has regularly been recognised in the area of competition law in a number of international competitions. Apart from the GCR rating, the firm’sname is mentioned in periodicals published by another renowned agency – Chambers Global, which considers HAVEL & PARTNERS as having one of the best records in the area of competition law in the Czech Republic. The law firm has also been awarded the prestigious client-rated ILO Client Choice 2015 Award in the Antitrust/Competition category. Its partner Robert Neruda is a recommended expert on competition law listed in the International Who’s Who of Competition Lawyers & Economists, ILO Client Choice and the Chambers Europe Guide. In 2013, 2015, 2016 and 2017, the law firm ranked first in the Czech competition Law Firm of the Year in the competition law category and in 2011, 2012 and 2014 was rated as a highly recommended law firm in the same category. In 2017, Robert Neruda managed to succeed in the Innovative Lawyer of the Year Award and was recognised as a Thought Leader by GCR, as a Competition Future Leader by Who’s Who Legal and in 2018 as a Thought Leader. He and Petr Kadlec, another firm partner, are acknowledged in the Who’s Who Legal general list of recommended experts on competition. HAVEL & PARTNERS has the highest number of experts listed in this guide of all law firms doing business in the Czech Republic.
Authors: David Neveselý, Martina Zezulková
Source: Lexology
The last parts of the amendment of Act No. 89/2012 Sb., Civil Code (the “Civil Code”) and of Act No. 304/2013 Sb., on public registers (the “Public Registers Act”), which introduces records of trusts in particular (the “Records”), became effective on 1 January 2018. As the amendment is bringing about significant changes in the operation of trusts in Czech Republic (the “trust”), we recommend you take a closer look.
Why?
By enacting the Records, the legislature seeks to establish a certain degree of transparency in the relationships created by a trust. The interest in raising the transparency has already been articulated on the EU level and is closely connected to efforts to prevent financial system abuse or, more precisely, to curb money-laundering, which potentially benefits from the so far opaque ownership structures.
Who keeps the Records and what is recorded?
The duty to keep the Records lies with the register (regional) courts. The Records include among other things the trust’s name, purpose, date of its formation and termination, identification number, the trustee’s identification data, number of trustees and the way they act on behalf of the trust, the founder’s identification data, and the beneficiary’s identification data.
Who has access to the Records?
The Records are only partially public, i.e. the public can only see the trust’s name, date of its formation and termination, identification number, the trustee’s first and last name and delivery address, the number of trustees and the way they act. Further data on the trustee and other registered persons (founder, beneficiary, person supervising the trust administration and other persons exerting a decisive influence) will be published only upon their consent. A full copy containing all recorded data will be provided only to the trustee and the persons who have proved their legal interest. Under given conditions, enumerated entities (public authorities in particular) will be granted remote access to these data for carrying out identifications and checks.
Joyful news to conclude with: fees and time limits
What can be viewed as rather positive news about the Records is the fact that registration and changes in the Records are exempt from court fees. On the other hand, a duty has been enacted to submit an application to register changes in the Records within 15 days from the relevant fact, and the trustee is responsible for maintaining the trust records in line with reality.
Last, it must be noted that a trust which was formed before this amendment came into effect has the duty to register in the Records within six months from the date the amendment takes effect. If it fails to do so, the trust administration will be terminated. Naturally, our team of experts specialising in this area is ready to assist you both in forming a new trust under the new regulation and in registering an already existing trust in the newly established Records.
Authors: Petr Sprinz, Petr Chytil
Source: Lexology
Intensive debate is currently under way in EU bodies on the proposal for a directive that could have a substantial impact on insolvency proceedings and the restructuring process in individual EU Member States. The proposal No. 2016/0359/COD[1] (“Proposal”) submitted by the European Commission envisages, among other things, the establishment of a legal framework governing informal restructuring of corporations’ financial engagement (“Informal Restructuring”). There is no such instrument in the Czech Republic and it has often been called for not only by our clients. Apart from the Informal Restructuring, the Proposal makes it clear that the national insolvency law should be gradually increasingly harmonised in individual EU Member States. In this article we will introduce the Informal Restructuring concept and draw attention to certain issues encountered in the Proposal. In fact, there is a risk that a number of provisions will be misused.
In what way does the Informal Restructuring differ from reorganisation?
The Czech Insolvency Act provides for reorganisation as one of the methods of addressing a company’s bankruptcy. Reorganisation allows debtors to handle the crisis in a flexible way, which is especially expedient for larger entities. Nonetheless, a reorganisation is public, relatively costly and is governed by formal insolvency proceeding regulations.
As opposed to reorganisation, Informal Restructuring does not constitute a formal method of tackling bankruptcy. It is an out-of-insolvency and practically a non-public way of resolving a crisis; its aim is to prevent bankruptcy. Based on the Proposal, which establishes the duty of Member States to transpose the Informal Restructuring into national regulations, the corporations concerned should moreover keep at least partial control of their assets and the day-to-day operation of the business.
A stay of individual enforcement actions under Informal Restructuring
One of the key mechanisms of Informal Restructuring is proposed to be the stay of individual enforcement. This instrument restricts individual enforcement of claims by creditors, except for employees’ outstanding claims. The measure is primarily intended as a protection against creditors who are not willing to discuss restructuring, and are eager to enforce their claims individually.
It is at courts’ sole discretion to grant this measure. Since the instrument is at risk of being misused by companies seeking restructuring, individual creditors may apply to courts for refusal to grant the measure or for cancellation of an already granted measure. The duration of the stay measures should not, as a rule, exceed 4 months. The corporation concerned should prepare a restructuring plan in the meantime.
Other impacts of the above-mentioned stay of enforcement include, among other things: (i) the suspension of the obligation to file for insolvency; (ii) a limitation on the right of the creditors concerned to withdraw from contracts or to withhold performance from already signed contracts; (iii) the right of a corporation to request appointing a restructuring expert. These measures should facilitate the restructuring and protect the company from suppliers who would otherwise default.
Funding provided to debtors on the verge of bankruptcy and ways to address this
In our banking practice, we have many times experienced a strong reluctance on the part of banks and other entities to engage in refinancing of borrowers on the verge of bankruptcy. A number of clients did not want to risk that the funding provided could subsequently be challenged in insolvency proceedings. This is especially true of transactions with an international element where several differing insolvency regulations enter into play. Often, however, refinancing of existing credit exposure, or the increase in its volume, is one of the conditions for preserving plant operations and averting bankruptcy.
In this respect, the Proposal offers a solution: excluding transactions from respondent’s actions under the insolvency law. Furthermore, the Proposal allows Member States to grant preferential status to claims under the new funding compared to other claims registered in insolvency proceedings.
The Proposal seeks in particular to incentivise entities to provide the necessary funding not only to implement the restructuring plan but also to ensure the plant remains in operation during the restructuring negotiations. Our experience has shown that without cash-flow hedging, it is very difficult to prevent the value of company’s assets from falling until the restructuring plan has been endorsed.
However, the drawback of the protection of new funding lies in the fact that the restructured company could abuse the mechanism and conclude a disadvantageous funding agreement without being able to review it later. The role of respondents’ actions is often crucial in insolvency proceedings, since it is possible to use them to seek ineffectiveness of legal acts that have damaged the creditors. If the Informal Restructuring fails, the legitimate interests of other creditors may be jeopardised in subsequent insolvency proceedings as a result of new funding.
To prevent possible abuse, creditors are to be provided with double protection, both quantitative and qualitative. The protection will be granted only to financing that will be essential for resuming the day-to-day business of the borrower or for its survival until the restructuring plan has been endorsed. If the new financing transactions are made fraudulently or unfaithfully, other creditors will be able to counteract them.
What next?
The Proposal is currently being discussed by the EU Council’s working bodies and its final wording is likely to be modified further. The manner of transposing the regulation into the Czech system of laws, however, will be more fundamental than the final wording of the directive. If the Proposal is adopted, its transposition will result in a number of double-edged provisions. Although the Proposal seeks to introduce a number of anti-abuse instruments, the question is whether the protection will be sufficient or whether the new provisions will do more harm than good depending primarily on the quality of the transposition. If implemented, its practical application might reveal any other possible flaws.
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HAVEL & PARTNERS, the largest Czech-Slovak law firm, ranked first in the TOP Employer Awards for the fourth consecutive year again in 2018. The firm (until the end of 2017 called Havel, Holásek & Partners) was voted the most attractive employer among law firms in the Czech Republic. What’s more, the best-performing law students placed the law firm first in the Lawyer category for the second time, a category dominated by international law firms in previous years. The results were posted by the Czech Student and Alumni Association.
| “We highly appreciate the fact that the forthcoming generation of lawyers sees us as a prestigious and attractive employer. When I was a student, the ultimate goal of most students was to work for an international company. I’m glad to hear that we have managed to reverse this long-term trend, even among elite students who gave us the biggest number of preferential votes this year again. I would like to thank all students for taking part in the survey and I hope that we will engage in successful cooperation with a number of them,” Jaroslav Havel, the law firm’s managing partner, comments on the awarded recognition. The 2018 TOP Employer study results correspond to the position of the law firm in the legal firm market. The company has been the largest and the most dynamic law firm in Central and Eastern Europe for a long time and currently has nearly 200 lawyers, over 100 attorneys and approximately 80 students of predominantly law faculties in four of its offices in Prague, Brno, Ostrava and Bratislava. “Students that become part of our team not only have immediate access to our vast corporate know-how; even more importantly, from the very early stage of their career they get the opportunity to work for the most demanding clients, that means the best-performing Czech and global companies, side by side with top experts and experienced senior associates. That is surely one of the reasons why we are an attractive employer for our younger colleagues,” explains Josef Hlavička, a partner in charge of HR. HAVEL & PARTNERS offers an exceptional work place to its employees. Since 2014, its Prague offices have been located in the modern and architecturally timeless Florentinum building, which was recognised as the best office space in Central and Eastern Europe in the prestigious international Central & Eastern European Real Estate Quality Awards (CEEQA) in 2014. Three years later HAVEL & PARTNERS received the TOP Offices award for the best work environment for employees and clients among law firms in the Czech Republic. In 2015, the Brno offices moved to Titanium, a contemporary complex of administrative buildings in downtown Brno. In the second half of 2017, the Slovak offices also moved – to exclusive offices in Zuckermandel, a new administrative neighbourhood close to the Bratislava Castle. |
Law firm HAVEL & PARTNERS has provided comprehensive legal advisory to SUDOP GROUP a.s., the largest group of construction project companies in the Czech Republic, on the establishment of a new subsidiary providing IT services, Sudop Consulting and Information Technology a.s., and the subsequent acquisition of a 70% interest in the software company LinkSoft Technologies. The aim of these strategic steps was to diversify and expand the group’s business activities and to take advantage of the synergy among information technology and engineering and project development activities.
The legal advisory team was led by Jan Koval, a partner at HAVEL & PARTNERS, and Jiří Buryan, a managing associate. The parties have decided not to disclose the transaction value.
SUDOP GROUP a.s. provides planning, design and engineering works for transport, industrial, water management and power-generator constructions and public amenity buildings in individual market segments. Together with its subsidiaries and ownership interests in other companies, the group controls assets worth nearly CZK 4 billion.
LinkSoft Technologies develops tailored software and outsources IT experts. It has been on the market for ten years and has been able to win customers not only in the Czech Republic, but also in Australia, Canada and Iraq. In 2017 its turnover reached CZK 140 million.
The largest Czech-Slovak law firm HAVEL & PARTNERS presented a cheque worth CZK 100,000 to Bílý kruh bezpečí, a non-profit organisation, at the Lawyer of the Year 2017 Awards ceremony. The organisation has been providing professional and discreet assistance free of charge to victims of crime for as long as 26 years. Bílý kruh bezpečí will use the donated funds for direct monetary assistance to the victims and/or their survivors.
“We have been handing over the charity cheque at the Lawyer of the Year event traditionally every year; last year we supported the endowment fund AutTalk helping parents to take care of their children with autism, and the year before that we helped the Our Child Foundation. This year we decided to provide funding to Bílý kruh bezpečí because it is a highly respectable organisation that has been supporting victims of crime and their surviving relatives and victims of domestic violence for a number of years. The organisation also directs a considerable amount of its effort to the prevention of conflicts with possible criminal law implications,” says Jaroslav Havel, managing partner of the law firm, commenting on its support to Bílý kruh bezpečí. “As part of our work we often represent victims of crime that are under the care of Bílý kruh bezpečí, so we can see how crucial the foundation’s support is in such extremely difficult circumstances,” adds Filip Seifert, of law firm SEIFERT A PARTNEŘI, which is an exclusive partner of HAVEL & PARTNERS in the area of criminal law.
“We highly appreciate this support, and we will use it as financial support provided directly to the victims in need or to their survivors,” says Petra Vitoušová, the founder and manager of Bílý kruh bezpečí. “I would like to point out that František Korbel, a partner of the law firm, previously held the position of the deputy minister at the Ministry of Justice of the Czech Republic and in 2013 received an honourable mention for his personal commitment in pushing through the bill for victims of crime, which has considerably enhanced the position of victims in criminal proceedings,” says Vitoušová.
The law firm provides direct funding to charitable foundations and projects, including e.g. Our Child Foundation, the Světluška collection of the Czech Radio Foundation, Via foundation, Dejme dětem šanci, Dobrý anděl, Debt Advisory Centre – Counselling in Stringency and the already mentioned AutTalk endowment fund last year, and also focuses on pro bono legal advisory, i.e. legal services provided free of charge.
As part of its pro bono legal advisory, the law firm supports the Prague ZOO;, Children’s Crisis Centre, Taťána Kuchařová’s foundation called the Beauty of Help; the Světluška collection of the Czech Radio Foundation; the Registered Social Responsibility Institute, whose aim is to protect minors from addictive substances; and the Association for the Defence of Unjustly Prosecuted Persons, among others.
As part of its CSR activities, HAVEL & PARTNERS also supports the involvement of employees as volunteers, who take part in charity runs and sales, provide advisory to children from children’s homes, organise charitable breakfasts or collections, etc. The law firm also engages various charitable organisations and sheltered workshops as its regular suppliers of goods and services.
