Partner Perspectives: Nishant Choudhary & Seka Hep

With different investment opportunities coming into Cambodia, how do you view the current market? 

The current market is pretty promising. We see a fair bit of opportunities which is bound to come in the country. And as you would be aware about the forecasts which has been predicted by ADB and World Bank at the same time, sovereign range of 5.4 to from 2024 to 6% in 2025 as per World Banks report, which will be primarily driven by infrastructure investments in the country. So there is a euphoria in market based on these understanding now. But I would like to draw attention as to how Cambodia had fared post COVID. You see Cambodia, one of the major sector performed prior to COVID was real estate sector, which saw a bit of downturn, which was primarily because of distress in China as majority of the real estate investments were happening from China in Cambodia. However, one positive aspect which ca me out of the COVID pandemic was the diversification of the supply chain.

Now Cambodia wanted to get a stake in that. Though there were other countries like Vietnam and Indonesia which had the ecosystem and had the required infrastructure in place or at least at a much advanced level than Cambodia which did take the lead. However, the diversification of supply chain is yet not at its optimum. There’s still room. The buy is big for everybody to share. So Cambodia pursuant to 2022 emphasised upon infrastructure and developing the ecosystem to attract manufacturing investments in the country.

Primarily the intention is to move from I would say an import based economy to more of an export based economy and that would diversify from usual garment, footwear and travel accessories industry to other areas of investments.

So to support that to buttress that requirement, Cambodia emphasised on primary infrastructures. As you would know, the highway between Lampard and Sianok will, the two airports 1 poised to open next year in Penampang, the one incm Reeb, the port in Sihanoukville, the SECC around Sihanoukville. All these infrastructures have been put in place or are being implemented within intention of attracting manufacturing investments in the country. So I believe the primary market which will see the growth in the country would be manufacturing along with the ancillary investments into infrastructure. But that won’t be it. Because you see, Cambodia has been an agrarian economy since long now. There has been a shift from conventional agricultural investments or activities to a more agreed tech driven processes. So you would see there are more technologies being implemented in agricultural process which is also piggybacking ecommerce.

So ecommerce is that as well there to support and buttress the agricultural activity which I believe if the ecosystem is in place for ecommerce to develop and grow, which will also be beneficial for manufacturing in general, one that takes its full grown shape. So with all that, I believe there is a fair bit of growth story to come. There is excitement in the market. However, if I move a bit from setups as a practice, I also see something very important.

See as we talked about real estate seeing correction. Now if you, if you see Cambodia, it has grown. It was a, it was a country at a level, say five years earlier and has grown to a level with more robust and more modern and more sophisticated forms of investments in the country.

Now with that the conventional dispute system ecosystem which was in place, that ecosystem was not fully equipped to support the modern, you know, if a distributary rest is necessary for modern investments, say your EPC contracts or disputes out of a more sophisticated joint venture agreement. So to address that, to address more commercial disputes in question, you would be aware that Cambodia established a centre called MCAC primarily to factor in commercial arbitrations in the country. So we see that there is a growth or a room for more modern and commercial dispute redressal practise growing in the country. And we see a room for firms like ours, which basically have, the international practises to come in and hone that practice to come in and, and, and bring about that credit enhancement to the practice, which will be for the better service of the investors and our clients.

Have any new laws or legislation come into play that are likely to impact this going forward?

Cambodia have developed a lot over the last three years, particularly during COVID time. So it’s a time to review light itself as a country. So over this. There’s a lot of regulation has been adopted, For example, large investments, ecommerce, trust law, lot of consumer protections.

Let’s actually lower that change a lot the way we were before that also help us to develop ourselves in order to adapt with the new context of Cambodia and in the futures. What I know is that there’s another law would keep impacts on the market as well, it’s the chain of the landlord.

DFDL has consistently been highly ranked by The Legal 500; but what do you see as the main points that differentiate your firm from your competitors?

What the main differentiator between us and our competitors is a footprint in the region and the period we have been here. We started off as a pioneering firm to a leader in the region. And that comes from the fact that we have expertise. We have people who are grounded in subject matters and sector experiences across our region and they can be always pooled into for a matter say one specific jurisdiction versus another. So that’s one of our bandwidth where we can also go ahead and give a regional platform a single point of contact for many jurisdictions in the region, which is one of the major plus we have. We have at the same time invested heavily in into our resources, into our tech, into our innovations, into our processes. So all these together gives us that competitive advantage over our competitors in the region.

Which practices do you see growing in the next 12 months? What are the drivers behind that?

I would like to elaborate about the new law on investment into a little bit because it’s a very attractive legal framework. So the government give more incentive compared to the new law. And also the government encourage a lot of creativity, creativity. So the least of the data activities become shorter and shorter. And also there’s a rule for interpretation that the government think that it is good. The government will give a lot more incentive compared to the new to the old investment law. Cambodia is a very good country located in the Southeast Asia and also it’s a country that reach inland. So that would attract a lot of investments. And also the government now it’s a young and dynamic component of the government. So they are ready to hear and to resolve any problem data investor would have during their investment in Cambodia. And also what it’s like to the upcoming new landlord. Because I see that in the draft, there’s a lot of new provisions that have investor and have these unresolved issue that having in the past 20 years that really a good opportunity for investor to come to Cambodia.

What’s the main change you’ve made in the firm that will benefit clients?

The first change you would see is the new office which we have just moved into in Cambodia. But primarily if you look at it, we have moved from a practise or a subject based practise to more of a project based practise. So that has brought about efficacy for our team to operate into and also IT services our client in a better way.

We have heavily invested into processes. We have brought in expertise for quality initiatives into our flow. We have brought in professionals to look into operational efficacies in our firm. So all these together have been some of the significant changes which has bettered how we are working in our operations and delivering services to our client. Importantly, we have also factored a fair bit of improvisation as far as tech space is concerned. We have brought in technology and innovation to assist us in better delivering our lives.

Is technology changing the way you interact with your clients and the services you can provide them?

I believe technology is the biggest disruptor but a positive one across the globe and we have tried to make use of it as well in our operations. We have brought in more tech driven backbone for our operations in the country. We have utilised tech possibilities or tech infrastructures to better train our advisors and our staff went from professionals across the region and from other parts of the world.

We have brought in better documentation management system. We have gone ahead and tried to improvise on the existing tech possibilities within the legal industry and have tried to implement it to the best optimal possibilities in our culture.

Can you give us a practical example of how you have helped a client to add value to their business?

This is a culture of the appeal. So we were not just only want to be the lawyer of the client, we want to be the business partner of the client’s. So I think the value at the value added that we can offer to the client nowadays is not just theory, we give the client very practical answer and very practical approach for the client to consider. So actually, for example, that I can share with you is that that’s one transactions that I handle for the client for almost 10 years that it happened that want is action is a very small value.

And then the plan went to half the series of the theory of methodology that they have put in place about 10 years already. So like I don’t hesitate to tell the client that this is for my personal view. I don’t think that the client should conduct in such a way because it’s a waste of time, consume a lot of money. So I think that I would suggest to have a very short and practical method as opposed to the very traditional method that decline has carried on for more than 10 years. So with that, we receive a lot of good feedback and appreciation from the client because the client said that

you are the only one who changed the culture by saying that if it were me, I would do a different way. That’s the value added to the client. And I like to save the clients. I would not advise the client to do thing which is unnecessary or I would say the client that the risk is very tiny. So maybe you hold on a little bit and wait to see what is the reaction from the authority of the government.

And in addition to that, when I say that we are business partner to the client because not just only read, read the lower, but DFL is also the member of some committee of the government who give feedback directly to the government when things does not go right. I think this is very important can lead the market that we should change the way that lawyer behave in traditional way.

Are clients looking for stability and strategic direction from their law firms – where do you see the firm in three years’ time?

See, this year marks the 30th anniversary of DFL in the region. We have throughout our establishment and throughout our journey in the region, factored on our personals, factored on innovation day, but primarily our core, the very basis of our practice has been to try and achieve a solution driven approach for our clients. We would want to avoid to be seen as a firm, which is more theoretical than not practical.

So we are trying to work towards it. We are trying to achieve that. For us that and along with the debt, the personnels, the innovations, the resources to train our personnels we have brought into. We believe that in the next three years period, we would continue to be the market leader and go beyond from there, diversify into different practises, be ready and equipped for new avenues to open up and be ahead of the curve to be ready and in place to assist the investors and clients.