About

Han Wai Khor leads the legal team at ICBC International Holdings (ICBCI) as general counsel, managing director, supervising eight lawyers with qualifications from Hong Kong, PRC, Singapore, the UK and US and two non-lawyers in legal executive and corporate secretary roles. The legal roles are differentiated by the various business lines that each of them support respectively, with the general counsel overseeing legal matters across the all of the firm’s business functions. Haitio Zhu, senior legal counsel, overseas the China team and all PRC legal matters. Jo Wong, senior legal counsel, manages all corporate finance matters including equity and debt capital markets. Kenneth Kwan, legal counsel, is in charge of investment management and asset management business. Grace Leung, legal counsel, is in charge of sales and trading business and research team matters. Kevin Yu, legal counsel, is on the China team and handles PRC related matters, and Rae Guo, legal counsel, works on investment management business. In line with the growth of ICBCI’s businesses in the last few years, including the rolling out of new business lines (for example, into the TMT space), new product categories (including structured products and PRC futures) and ICBCI’s expansion into new markets (including Australia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Thailand, the UK and US), ICBCI’s legal team has had to expand its legal support coverage to encompass the above new areas. In order to meet these challenges, ICBCI has, in addition to maintain good relationships with panel firms, added two legal counsels to the team, Kevin Yu and Rae Guo. The legal team has acted in many of the biggest transactions in the Asia Pacific region. For example, a US$16bn GLP privatisation in which ICBCI and its affiliates provided both equity (US$120m) and debt financing (US$400m) to the consortium led by Hillhouse capital and Global Logistics Property’s management. Similarly the team worked on the Wanda Commercial Properties HKEX privatisation. This landmark transaction which involved Dalian Wanda raising equity financing from many prominent on and offshore companies to undertake the circa HK$34bn privatisation exercise of Dalian Wanda Commercial Properties. ICBCI provided equity financing of HK$1bn to Dalian Wanda (the offeror entity backed by tycoon Wang Jianlin) to partially fund this exercise. The team strive to consistently and effectively deliver quality legal advice of a constructive nature to our internal clients, seeking to facilitate business objectives while protecting our firm against potential legal, regulatory and reputational risks. Wai Khor says that ‘we are fortunate (and proud to say) that the legal team is a department with strong standing within ICBCI. The influence our department enjoys within the organisation is the result of the trust and rapport that the legal team has built up and established with our senior management and business teams through the consistent delivery of quality legal advice and the ability of the team to provide innovative and constructive legal solutions in response to business needs and challenges over the years. We have also received various internal awards within ICBCI which evidence the high regard with which the team is held within ICBCI’.