The Asia-Pacific region has seen a record year for both M&A and IPO activity, as markets begin to revive from the COVID-19 pandemic. As in other years, the ALB Dealmakers list celebrates the standout lawyers who helped make these deals happen.
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NICHOLAS CHAN |
An expert in capital markets and corporate finance transactions, including initial public offerings and general compliance work, Nic has nearly two decades of legal experience. He has advised both issuers and underwriters in relation to IPOs on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKEx). Among his noteworthy matters, Nic has acted as the Hong Kong legal adviser to Guotai Junan Capital Limited as the sole sponsor in the listing and global offering of China General Education Group Limited on the main board of the HKEx. He has also advised Morimatsu International Holdings Company Limited in its listing and global offering on the main board of the HKEx. Additionally, Nic represented Vesync Co., Ltd as the Hong Kong Legal adviser in its listing and global offering on the HKEx’s mainboard. In addition, Nic has also advised a number of listed companies including 360 Ludashi Holdings Limited, Chen Xing Development Holdings Limited, China Parenting Network Holdings Limited, China Qinfa Group Limited, Duiba Group Limited, Everbright Grand China Assets Limited, Icon Culture Global Company Limited, IGG Inc, Innovax Holdings Limited, Intron Technology Holdings Limited, Luk Hing Entertainment Group Holdings, Morimatsu International Holdings Company, NetDragon Websoft Holdings Limited, Peiport Holdings Ltd., Shuanghua Holdings Limited, Taizhou Water Group Co., Ltd., Tu Yi Holdings Company Limited, Vesync Co., Ltd, Xinming China Holdings Limited and Yunnan Water Investment Co., Limited. Nic, who has been retained as the lead partner and legal advisor of a diverse range of Hong Kong-listed issuers, has received much acclaim from clients for his deep capital market experience and keen legal insight.
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SOICHIRO FUJIWARA |
Fujiwara has been with Nagashima Ohno & Tsunematsu (NO&T) for more than 23 years. His practice focuses on mergers and acquisitions and private equity transactions. He also handles technology transactions and general corporate matters. He has led on various deals, some of which include the acquisition of shares in Yamato Home Convenience by Art Corporation, where he was the lead counsel to Yamato Holdings; acquisition of Dialog by Renesas Electronics; Integration of Dai-Nippon Meiji Sugar Co and Mitsui Sugar Co; and acquisition of Daytona International by Unison Capital, where he was the lead counsel to Unison Capital. Furthermore, Fujiwara represented Canon Marketing Japan in the capital and business alliance between Canon Marketing Japan and Keyware Solutions; and advised on the acquisition of All Hearts Company by Unison Capital. He was also lead counsel to Unison Capital in the acquisition of N Field by Unison Capital and represented Canon Marketing Japan (seller) in the acquisition of Edifist Learning by Comture. In addition, Fujiwara advised as Japanese law counsel to Shire PLC on the acquisition of Shire PLC by Takeda Pharmaceuticals, as well as lead NO&T’s capital and business alliance with MNTSQ and collaboration in the area of LegalTech. Fujiwara, who was admitted to practice law in Japan in 1998, worked in the San Francisco office of Morrison & Foerster as a visiting international attorney from 2003 to 2004. He has also been an adjunct lecturer at Sophia University Law School since 2008 and at Kyoto University Law School since 2009.
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YO OTA |
Ota focuses on corporate and commercial transactions, M&A, defence against shareholder activism, compliance, startups and venture capital, capital markets, international taxation, civil and commercial disputes, telecommunications/media, corporate crisis management, tax counselling and tax disputes issues. Ota, who has been a partner at Nishimura & Asahi since 2003, has been admitted in Japan since 1993 and in New York since 2001. With close to three decades of legal experience, he has acted on various matters. He acted on the sale of Tokyo Dome Corporation following a high-profile takeover battle, one of the biggest and most prominent in Japan in 2020. This deal was named M&A Deal of the Year (Midsize) at the ALB Japan Law Awards 2021. In 2021, Ota successfully defended Tokyo Kikai Seisakusho against an attempted hostile takeover and used the MoM condition to secure a ruling in favour of his client from the Supreme Court of Japan. Ota also represented SBI Holdings in a hostile takeover bid against Shinsei Bank, which was the first unfriendly acquisition attempt brought against a major bank in Japan. He also advised Nishimatsu Construction on its defence against a famous Japanese activist fund. Ota led the team advising Mitsubishi Heavy Industries on the sale of its machine tool business to Nidec Corporation. Ota was also selected in ALB’s Top 15 M&A Lawyers in Asia 2021 and Dealmakers of Asia 2020, and he won the title of Dealmaker of the Year at the ALB Japan Law Awards 2020. |
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KOKI YAMADA |
Yamada, who has over 15 years of legal experience, is an expert in corporate and M&A law. In April 2019, he co-established Tokyo International Law Office, a firm which focuses on cross-border legal affairs such as cross-border M&A, anti-trust, global compliance and international disputes. He was admitted to the Daini Tokyo Bar Association in 2006 and the New York Bar Association in 2011. Yamada has advised and led on various deals. Among some of his notable deals, he led the team which represented NEC in the acquisition of Avaloq Group AG by NEC Corporation. His team also led the same client in the partial transfer of Avaloq shares by NEC to JICT. Furthermore, Yamada was the lead partner of the deal team which counselled Asahi Breweries in Asahi’s formation of a joint venture with BrewDog for the sale of products of BrewDog. He also represented LIXIL in the formation of a joint venture with an international company. A few important clients of Yamada include Toyota Motors Corporation, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, Dai-ichi Life Holdings, M3. Inc, Inoac Corporation, Hudson Sustainable Group, Flex-N-Gate Group, Unifa, Almit GmbH, Chodai CO., Fund Corporation for the Overseas Development of Japan’s ICT and Postal Services, and Smart Holdings. Prior to the launch of Tokyo International Law Office, Yamada worked with a number of other law firms. An alumnus of Columbia Law School, Yamada was earlier appointed as statutory auditor (external) of LegalForce.
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LI HE
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Li He, a specialist in capital markets, is the Co-head of Davis Polk & Wardwell’s practice in Asia (excluding Japan). He has been a leading practitioner in the field and the most trusted adviser to many high profile companies and financial institutions. Li started his legal career at Davis Polk’s headquarters in New York. Afterwards, he rotated through the fi rm’s Hong Kong and Beijing offices. He helped the firm establish its Beijing office in 2007. In 2018, he returned to Hong Kong to take on an executive leadership position. He continues to grow Davis Polk’s China practice by expanding its corporate client base, and this has been a tremendous success. He has extensive experience guiding companies through their most critical milestones – from pre-initial public offerings (IPOs) financing through listing and beyond. He has guided on the three largest HKEX IPOs of all time · Agricultural Bank of China, ICBC, and AIA. He also acted on three of the six largest U.S. IPOs by Chinese companies · iQiyi, KE Holdings and JD. To date, he has worked on 127 IPOs (70 Hong Kong IPOs and 57 U.S. IPOs, and counting). His practice focuses on three vibrant and fast-growing industries — TMT, consumer, and healthcare. A significant portion of these IPOs were for Chinese tech companies across all the key verticals, with particular focus on enterprise services (Ming Yuan Cloud, Tuya, Kingsoft Cloud), and internet and e-commerce platforms (NetEase, Meituan Dianping, DouYu, and Tencent Music). Recently, he advised the joint sponsors on Baidu’s $3.1 billion IPO and secondary listing on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKEX). It is Asia’s first AI stock that is dual-listed in both Hong Kong and the United States. Davis Polk advised on both transactions, demonstrating a long-standing relationship with the client and continuity in its leading market position. Earlier this year, he also acted on Tuya’s $915 million US IPO – which was the first IoT cloud plat-form IPO globally. In the last 12 months, he also led the execution of a series of noticeable IPOs of China’s popular consumer brands — PopMart, Nayuki, Helens, and Youran. He is also a heavyweight in the healthcare sector with a slew of significant IPOs under his belt, most recently Tigermed, JOINN Laboratories, Ping An Healthcare, etc. Among his accolades, he was awarded Dealmaker of the Year – International at the ALB China Law Awards in 2020. |
THE LIST
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CHINA DEALMAKERS 2021 |
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Domestic |
International |
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Peter Wang Xiaoliang Wu Xin Kong Shoushuang Li Michael Yu Shuangjuan Wei Charles LI Zhiqiang Zhang (Nelson) Hui Zhou Yongliang Zhang Leo Wang George Niu Han Hao |
Howard Wu Tim Wang Ulrike Glueck Howard Zhang Gulnur Nurkeyeva Judie Ng Shortell Mark HU, Partner Ian C. Ho Paloma Wang Gwen Wong Dan Ouyang |
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HONG KONG DEALMAKERS 2021 |
INDIA DEALMAKERS 2021 |
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Betty Yap Grace Pengpeng Yan Hank Lo Jonathan Stone Kay Ian Ng Li He Marcia Ellis Nicholas Chan Siqi Fu |
Akshay Pathak Aparajit Bhattacharya Ashwath Rau Charandeep Kaur Haigreve Khaitan L. Vishwanathan Nusrat Hassan Raghubir Menon Shashank Mittal Sujjain Talwar |
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INDONESIA DEALMAKERS 2021 |
JAPAN DEALMAKERS 2021 |
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Antonius Alexander Tigor Arie Armand Emir Nurmansyah Erwandi Hendarta Fahrul S. Yusuf Hendra Ong Jennifer B. Tumbuan Luky I. Walalangi Maurice Maulana Sitomorang Pablo Malay Pheo M. Hutabarat Pramudya A. Oktavinanda Putu Suryastuti Rambun Tjajo |
Alan G. Cannon Gavin Raftery Go Hashimoto John Tessensohn Katsumasa Suzuki Keiji Hatano Ken Lebrun Koki Yamada Soichiro Fujiwara Tong Yu Yo Ota Yusuke Abe |
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MALAYSIA DEALMAKERS 2021 |
PHILIPPINES DEALMAKERS 2021 |
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Lilian Liew Nazmi Bin Mohd Zaini Stephanie Phua |
Aris Gulapa Mark Gorriceta |
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SOUTH KOREA DEALMAKERS 2021 |
SOUTHEAST ASIA DEALMAKERS 2021 |
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H. Young Shin Ho Joon Moon Jaewoo Lee Jin Kook Lee Jinduk Han Sung-Jin Kim Sungjo Yun Teo Kim Tong-Gun Lee |
Antonius Alexander Tigor Dewi Savitri Reni Emir Nurmansyah Jennifer B. Tumbuan Julian Kwek Luky Walalangi Luu Tien Ngoc Nigel Gleeson Pablo Malay Pramudya A. Oktavinanda Rajiv Gupta Tony Budidjaja |
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FEMALE DEALMAKERS 2021 |
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INDIA AND MIDDLE EAST |
NORTH ASIA |
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Adity Chaudhury Akshay Pathak Ashwini Vittalchar Danielle Lobo Naina Krishna Murthy Niloufer Lam Nisha Kaur Uberoi Pallavi Bedi Pritha Jha Puja Sondhi Reeba Chacko Roma Priya Shivpriya Nanda Talha Salaria Twinky Rampal |
Asa Shinkawa Benita Yu Betty Yap Bonnie L. Dixon Clara Shirota Effie Vasilopoulos Hyeon Hwa Shin Hyunju Helen Pak Jihyeong Park Joceline Park June Chan Kayoung Kim Marcia Ellis Miranda So Priscilla Lee Stephanie Tang Yoon Kyung Chang |
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FEMALE DEALMAKERS 2021 |
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SOUTHEAST ASIA |
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Anna Tipping Charunun Sathitsuksomboon Christy Lim Hoang Nguyen Ha Quyen Jacqueline Chan Kala Anandarajah Kaya Proudian Melissa Butarbutar Poppy Cut Rahmasuci Renu Menon Stephanie Keen Veeranuch Thammavaranucupt |