Deacons

Corporate Commercial practice group

Consultant

Edwarde specializes in cross-border transactional and operational matters in Greater China.  He has over twenty years experience handling Hong Kong transactions and assisting foreign investors in China. He has assisted both foreign and domestic parties with inbound and outbound transactions involving the PRC.  He advises both operational and financial investors, including venture capital and private equity funds on portfolio investments.  He handles public and private mergers and acquisitions, reorganisations and direct investment transactions.

He has acted across a range of industries sectors and has handled major projects in manufacturing, electronics, pharmaceuticals, chemicals, medical devices, hotel/hospitality, technology, financial services, tobacco, energy and advertising industry sectors.   Transactions handled have included major green field projects and the acquisitions on non-circulating state owned shares, block share acquisitions of listed shares, negotiated acquisitions of registered capital and the conversion of non-circulating shares into listed shares.

He also advises on clean energy projects and has handled biogas, natured gas, hydro power and wind energy projects.  He has advised on PRC regulatory requirements and ERPA issues with respect to the acquisition of CERs under the Kyoto Protocol and other arrangements.

At an operational level, Edwarde advises on technology licensing and transfers, operational and distribution arrangements, anti-corruption investigations, treasury functions, general commercial agreements and labour matters.

Edwarde was resident in Beijing for three years.  He frequently spends time in the Deacons China offices.

Highlights

Assisting a French multinational with the establishment of major reconstituted tobacco joint venture production facility in Yunnan in a project that involved multiple PRC investors, including major state-owned enterprises, and required specialized industry sector approvals. Assisting the Bankruptcy estate of a major European auto manufacturer with the sale of its European production assets to a Chinese lead consortium, including multi-national investors with significant security arrangements. Assisting a major Japanese multinational in the acquisition of a controlling interest in a service business as an integral part of a strategic alliance with a major Hong Kong listed company which relationship included cross-holding of equity interests in each others subsidiaries in Hong Kong and China.  The transaction was a notifiable transaction under the rules of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. Assisting a major Brazilian mining conglomerate with PRC anti-monopoly clearance for a minority investment by a major Japanese multi-national in the development and exploitation of an integrated iron ore mining project in the State of Minas Gervias in Brazil.  This project did not involve any PRC entities. Assisting a major Japanese multinational on litigation and settlement arrangements related to the discontinuation of a major product line and the termination of the related processing contracts and distribution arrangements.  Disputes were handled both in the PRC and Hong Kong. Assisting a European private equity fund with the reorganization of its Hong Kong and PRC operations as a part of global reorganization and assisting with the review of portfolio investments. Assisting a French energy multinational with the review of seventeen 49.5 MW wind firm projects in Northern China and combined cycle power plants in Central and Southern China in connection with a green house gas emission reduction projects.

EnglishMandarin

The Law Society of Hong Kong

The State Bar of California

JD, UCLA School of Law, Los Angeles, California, 1989

MA, University of California, Berkeley, California, 1985

BA, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California, 1983

Branch Campus of the Beijing Foreign Languages Institute, Beijing, 1983