Hong Kong courts are world class and most companies would rather have their disputes against their Mainland China counter-parties resolved in Hong Kong instead of in Wuxi or Harbin. Hong Kong as jurisdiction of choice is alluring. But for all sorts of reasons, it’s a trap. Let me explain. In 2008, China and Hong Kong
China has adopted a plan to establish a cyberspace court in Hangzhou. The plan is for this court to accept filings electronically, try cases via livestream and hear only e-commerce and Internet related cases. Why Hangzhou? Under Chinese civil procedure law, lawsuits must be brought in the place of the defendant’s domicile. For companies, domicile
Pretty much every month, one of my law firm’s international lawyers gets an email or a phone call from someone (often a fellow lawyer) seeking assistance with making a China related document legal for some sort of use somewhere in the world. Maybe 40 percent of the time, the request relates to a need to
A German lawyer, representing a German company owed lots of money by a Chinese citizen, wrote me last week to discuss retaining my law firm to help the company collect on its debt by seizing U.S and Canada real property held by the Chinese citizen. This lawyer was coming to me because he had liked
The Wall Street Journal wrote how China is increasingly becoming the venue of choice for foreign company patent litigation. That's right. China.
With Amazon and Ebay having increased their efforts at bringing in Chinese sellers and with Chinese manufacturers branching out and making their own products, the number of companies contacting our international intellectual property lawyers about problems with counterfeit products and knockoffs has soared. If the problem involves infringing products being imported into the United States,
At least once a month, one of our international litigation lawyers will get a call or an email from a U.S. lawyer seeking our help in taking a U.S. judgment (usually a default judgment) to China to enforce. The thinking of the U.S. lawyer is that all we need to do is go to a
China Arbitration Clauses Chinese companies frequently require contract disputes be resolved through arbitration, often designating CIETAC in China as the arbitral institution. Many foreign companies are apprehensive about the fairness of arbitration in China. However, it’s important to understand Chinese arbitrators weigh both legal correctness and ethical equities when making decisions. This post discusses why
One of the many things that makes suing Chinese companies and individuals difficult is the requirement that service be done according to the Hague Convention on Service Abroad of Judicial and Extrajudicial Documents in Civil and Commercial Matters, to which China is a party. Service of an entity or person in China under the Hague
In Evidence Collection and Alternatives to “Discovery” in P.R.C. Litigation, China Law Insight discusses the lack of pretrial discovery in China court cases and why American companies and lawyers tend to be so ill-prepared for this. To grossly summarize and oversimplify the article, foreign (especially American) companies need to know the following three things about
