Every business encounters legal needs – whether as a result of commercial transactions, internal reorganisations, or specific projects. To help you in implementing these transactions effectively and efficiently, you will need a trusted, commercially savvy and responsive adviser.

With the support of multi-disciplinary professionals in the wider KPMG network, our team can offer a broad suite of support in general corporate and commercial matters, such as commercial contracts, corporate governance assistance, shareholder agreements, business set-up, Hong Kong employment and immigration law and technology licensing.

The team has advised on a wide variety of corporate matters in virtually every major sector, including technology, media and telecommunications, finance, pharmaceutical, steel, automotive, consumer products, healthcare, agriculture, aircraft, education, semiconductors, machinery, chemicals, infrastructure, construction and property development.

With companies and their employees increasingly becoming more global, acquisition and management of region-specific talent has also become increasingly important. At the centre of this trend is the Asia Pacific region, which can present challenges with often divergent employment regulations, languages and cultures. We can provide you with legal advice in Hong Kong, and also bridge the gap with other jurisdictions by tapping into our global network of experts.

Our expert employment team can assist you with the preparation or advice on employment contracts, executive stock option and related plans, the on-boarding and exits of employees (including internal transfers), privacy matters, corporate restructuring, employee handbook reviews.

Our team can advise you on employee investigations, advice on disciplinary actions and risk management issues, and on the development of best practice compliance programs to mitigate the risk of disputes.

In today’s dynamic commercial environment of new technologies, of explosive growth in personal data protection risk and regulation, and protection of intellectual property (IP) rights, present major challenges for any business. To succeed, businesses need to recognise and protect their intellectual property rights as key business assets, take steps to ensure their data and that of their customers and suppliers are protected and in compliance with regulations in the markets in which you operate, and manage and protect their technologies in an increasingly complex world of robotics, blockchain and artificial intelligence. Our team takes a business-driven approach which combines our legal expertise with our business acumen, to devise tailored solutions together with you in all aspects of knowledge-based assets, from creation, to commercialisation and protection.

Key areas where we can support you include:

• Portfolio management and development: advising on brand creation, intellectual property counselling, registration, audits and due diligence exercises
• Commercial exploitation and monetization of intellectual property: strategising on intellectual property structure in commercial deals; advising on, negotiating and drafting of a wide range of IP-related transactional agreements and collaborative development agreements
• Reputation management
• Know-how, trade secrets and confidential information protection and enforcement
• Technology and Internet-related IP issues
• Advertising, trade descriptions compliance

The SF Lawyers data privacy team is experienced in tackling complex issues relating to data protection and personal data privacy issues for multinational companies across a wide range of industries. In particular, the team assists clients on the collection, use, storage, disclosure, transfer and disposal of data.

In addition, the team often works together with KPMG Global Legal Services and other KPMG service lines to provide its clients with a complete offering on large data privacy projects. This is especially beneficial for multinational companies handling large volumes of data. The complete offering enables clients to understand and manage data privacy risks from multiple angles and jurisdictions.

Traditionally, delivering an infrastructure asset simplistically was no more than just building and supplying the physical asset for its intended purposes over a specific period. Nowadays, with global cities and their communities experiencing increasing expansion and growth, the demand for better technology and more efficient services, greater innovation and connectivity between global cities is becoming more of the day to day norm for everyday society. The community and market demands the development of long-term high-performing infrastructure assets that maximise social and economic return on the outlaying investment. No better example for this demand is evident than the unprecedented infrastructure growth taking place in the Asia Pacific region, and in particular, the Greater Bay Area.

The challenge has been laid down for the infrastructure industry to become more conscious of delivering long term responsible infrastructure that creates greater efficiency and technology, innovation and creativity, whilst being environmentally friendly. To deliver such success, requires strong collaboration, innovation and initiative from all stakeholders participating in an infrastructure project’s life-cycle. The Infrastructure team at SF Lawyers is a prime example of being able to demonstrate the capability, experience and more importantly, the responsibility to contribute to that success.

Working with commercially focused and experienced lawyers is one of the keys to creating infrastructure that provide long-term value for money and excellent results. Our team intimately understands the infrastructure market, and the specific drivers and KPIs infrastructure stakeholders need to successfully deliver. By balancing technical skills with deep market knowledge and the experience of working on complex and significant projects, our clients are provided with innovative and responsible, value for money and commercially focused solutions which reflect current market practices. Our rich experience across the full spectrum of a project’s lifecycle (starting from early project conception and development to full operations and maintenance) push our solutions to enable our clients to be able to future-proof their projects. Put simply, we get it.

Our team has experience in the delivery of all types of infrastructure projects globally including public transportation, airports, toll roads, power stations, schools, accommodation and hospitals, defence and office and commercial developments. The team has real experience across all contractual and commercial delivery arrangements ranging from the more complex multi-party privately financed initiative (or PPPs) structures, target cost/alliancing arrangements and the “more vanilla” direct construction delivery models.

Lastly, drawing on the vast experience of, and working in close collaboration with, KPMG’s global Infrastructure Advisory team, SF Lawyers provide a market leading and real “one-stop shop” solution and capability to clients.