Industry focus: Healthcare and life sciences
Hall of Fame
The lawyers at the very top of the profession, widely known and respected by peers and clients for their longstanding involvement in market-leading work.
Hall of fameVan Bael & Bellis
Partner Peter L’Ecluse focuses on life sciences, competition law and intellectual property (IP) rights.Life SciencesPeter’s expertise encompasses a wide range of areas, including registration, pricing and reimbursement matters, advertising issues and all aspects of competition law. He has successfully represented clients before civil courts, as well as Belgium’s administrative court, the Council of State, in challenging reimbursement decisions and rules imposing prescription requirements on physicians. Competition LawPeter has been involved in most of the significant cases arising before the Belgian competition authorities. His expertise in this area extends to merger control, dominant market positions and procedural issues. IP RightsPeter’s patent litigation practice focuses on the life sciences industry. For several years, he has acted as co-counsel for one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world, handling multi-jurisdictional patent litigation while defending valuable patents covering various active substances against generic competitors. Peter also acted as co-counsel in proceedings before the European Patent Office and the Belgian courts for a major medical devices company in patent litigation which covered three jurisdictions. He often advises on supplementary protection certificate patent extension issues and assists clients in dealing with counterfeit trade in pharmaceuticals.
Hall of fameVan Bael & Bellis
Partner Catherine Longeval specialises in litigation before the Belgian courts and advises clients on a wide range of issues, including life sciences law. Her expertise in this area covers laws governing medicines, biotech products, medical devices, cosmetics and food supplements, among other aspects. She also specialises in unfair market practices, distribution law, product liability, public procurement, employment law and general commercial law.
Rising stars
Rising stars with regular involvement in their team's key work, and recognition from peers or clients as being ones to watch.
Next Generation Partners
Junior partners with significant recognition from clients and peers in the market and key roles on multiple matters.
Crowell & Moring LLP
Jurgen Figys is a counsel in Crowell & Moring's Brussels office and a member of the Intellectual Property Group. Jurgen is one of the few lawyers in Belgium also to be trained as a biomedical scientist. He is therefore able to combine his scientific reasoning with his legal knowledge, a considerable asset in the technology-driven IP field.Jurgen predominantly works with clients in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry, with a particular focus on complex patent litigation and regulatory advice. He has particular experience in patent litigation with regard to invalidity, third-party opposition proceedings against counterfeit seizure, and preliminary injunction proceedings. His pre-contentious experience includes freedom-to-operate patent analysis and drafting protective letters. Jurgen is also involved in a number of trademark cases, such as parallel import litigation.Within life sciences, Jurgen provides strategic regulatory advice to pharmaceutical and biotech companies as well as national and European industry associations. His experience covers a broad range of regulatory issues like data exclusivity, EU marketing authorizations, pricing and reimbursement of medicinal products, advertising, medical devices, clinical trials, and data. Digital transformation in the health sector is also one of his main focus areas.Thanks to his scientific background, Jurgen is also able to advise clients on other EU regulatory issues with a technical angle. For example, Jurgen has an impressive, substantive knowledge of REACH through his work for a wide range of U.S. and EU-based clients. He also regularly advises on CLP issues. In addition to providing legal and strategic advice on REACH/CLP compliance, Jurgen is able in particular to assist clients with their more science-driven submissions to the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) (preliminary risk assessments of potential chemicals of concern, etc.).
Van Bael & Bellis
Partner Michael Clancy focuses on EU competition law, including advising clients on antitrust and cartel investigations, distribution, R&D collaborations, patent and trademark licensing and other commercial agreements, the clearance of mergers and joint ventures, and abuse of dominance issues. Michael has significant experience in the life sciences (pharmaceuticals, biotech, and medical devices), cosmetics, and software & technology sectors.His notable experience includes successfully defending clients in antitrust investigations by the European Commission in both the pharmaceutical and cosmetics sectors, his ongoing work on the appeal against the Commission's first decision on reverse-payment patent settlements in the pharma industry, as well as his ongoing work defending clients in the Commission’s auto-parts investigation. Michael also has in-depth experience advising a range of clients on their distribution, licensing, and other collaboration agreements.
Covington & Burling LLP
Leading individuals
The strongest partners in their field, leading on market-leading deals and endorsed by peers and clients alike.
Simmons & Simmons
With over 25 years of experience in advising clients in the Healthcare & Life Sciences industries, Annabelle Bruyndonckx is recognised as one of the leading sector lawyers in Belgium. Strongly focused on Medtech and the digitalisation of (consumer) healthcare, Annabelle assists international pharmaceutical and biotech companies and global medical device manufacturers, as well as food supplements and cosmetic businesses. As litigation specialist and regulatory expert, her practice at Simmons & Simmons LLP covers all parts of regulated products’ life cycle from R&D to marketing authorisation/CE marking, qualification issues, pricing and reimbursement, manufacture and distribution, public procurement, advertising, compliance, and product liability. Annabelle heads the Regulatory Affairs Education Group & is a board member of Healixia, the Belgian community of professionals involved in the lifecycle of medicines, medical devices, in-vitro diagnostics, and other health-related products. She is a regular speaker at international Healthcare and Life Sciences conferences.
Hall of fameCrowell & Moring LLP
Kristof focuses on (IP) litigation. With more than 25 years’ experience, he is widely respected for his pragmatic, innovative approach to dispute resolution. He is a seasoned advisor and perseverant litigator in complex patent and SPC litigation and regulatory cases, parallel import matters and cross-border issues. He often litigates before the Belgian and European courts, regulatory bodies and in mediation/arbitration. Kristof is experienced in the interplay between antitrust and IP and is sought out for his thought leadership regarding commercial, civil and criminal disputes, and for his knowledge of (international) procedural law issues. Clients include industrial conglomerates and major players in the life sciences and TMT sectors. Kristof frequently speaks at professional and academic conferences and has published many articles on intellectual property and private international law.
Comparative Guides
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Comparative Guides
Belgium: Pharmaceutical Advertising
Belgium
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