About

Hang Lung Properties, the operating arm of Hang Lung Group, is a leading Hong Kong company that can boasts an extensive real estate portfolio in Hong Kong as well as building, owning and managing world-class commercial complexes in key cities in mainland China since the 1990s. Margaret Yan is the director, general counsel and company secretary, leading a team of 39 lawyers and 20 non-lawyers. Under the general counsel, the team is divided into Hong Kong legal, China legal and company secretarial teams. Recently the team has provided legal support on various major sales and acquisitions in Hong Kong, and the total amount involved is more than HK$1.8bn. For example, the legal team provided advice and support to the business in respect of the acquisition of Amoycan Industrial Centre through a public auction held pursuant to the compulsory sale order granted by the Lands Tribunal. The legal team also supported the re-launch of the North Tower at the Grand Gateway 66 shopping mall in September 2018. In addition, the team worked closely with the business in dealing with the issues arising from a material renovation of the South Tower of the mall. The legal team also supports the leasing team to negotiate with top luxury brands regarding cross project deals working closely with the business in preparation for the opening of its first hotel in mainland China. Talking about the biggest challenges for the company in the next 12 months, Yan says, ‘the environment in which our company is operating is challenging, particularly [as we are] in the midst of a troubled geopolitical environment with the China-US trade dispute and deteriorating industry sentiment. Despite that, our company is performing well because we constantly take precautionary measures to mitigate any possible negative impact. All precautionary measures require meticulous planning and disciplined execution and our legal team has provided the necessary legal advice and support to our business in this planning process and disciplined execution’. The company upholds a corporate value to care about its people which is reflected in the legal team’s strategy as part of recruiting and retaining talent, with an emphasis on treating everyone with respect, whilst embracing and leveraging team diversity and focusing on people development and well-being. Commenting on the impact of legal technology, Yan states, ‘we have been using an online research platform to assist our legal researches on issues arising from our daily operations and to keep us updated on all legal developments relevant to our industry. This helps us achieve both efficiency and savings from engaging external lawyers. Our company secretarial team has already started using the board portal for managing board meeting documents effectively. Further, our legal team is responsible for providing internal training and legal advice in relation to cybersecurity and data protection’.