Activities
Follow our latest activities all over the world.
Martin Cauchon advises his clients primarily in international business law. He facilitates his business relationships with his clients by providing strategic advice on development, acquisitions, and strategic alliances. He draws on his years of experience as a member of senior management of companies, during which he designed and negotiated numerous transactions and alliances for Canadian ...
Read moreNathaly J. Vermette is a lawyer and trade-mark agent practicing in the area of business law with a focus on intellectual property law at the Montreal office of DS Avocats. She assists Canadian and international clients in acquiring, protecting and monetizing their intellectual property rights. She suports them in the registration and protection of property rights ...
Read moreData protection and privacy legal frameworks are evolving rapidly worldwide, and Asia is no exception. Over the past two years, several key jurisdictions have adopted new regulations or updated their existing data protection laws. These regulations, heavily influenced by the EU’s GDPR, set high standards of compliance for organizations handling personal data. Our Asia-based teams ...
Read moreData protection and privacy frameworks are increasingly being developed globally. This is particularly the case in Asia: in the past two years, several key jurisdictions, including China, India, Indonesia and Vietnam have either introduced their jurisdiction’s first-ever comprehensive data protection laws or are updating and reforming their existing privacy laws. These regulations are very much ...
Read moreData protection and privacy frameworks are increasingly being developed globally. This is particularly the case in Asia: in the past two years, several key jurisdictions, including China, India, Indonesia and Vietnam have either introduced their jurisdiction’s first-ever comprehensive data protection laws or are updating and reforming their existing privacy laws. These regulations are very much ...
Read moreData protection and privacy frameworks are increasingly being developed globally. This is particularly the case in Asia: in the past two years, several key jurisdictions, including China, India, Indonesia and Vietnam have either introduced their jurisdiction’s first-ever comprehensive data protection laws or are updating and reforming their existing privacy laws. These regulations are very much ...
Read moreData protection and privacy frameworks are increasingly being developed globally. This is particularly the case in Asia: in the past two years, several key jurisdictions, including China, India, Indonesia and Vietnam have either introduced their jurisdiction’s first-ever comprehensive data protection laws or are updating and reforming their existing privacy laws. These regulations are very much ...
Read moreData protection and privacy frameworks are increasingly being developed globally. This is particularly the case in Asia: in the past two years, several key jurisdictions, including China, India, Indonesia and Vietnam have either introduced their jurisdiction’s first-ever comprehensive data protection laws or are updating and reforming their existing privacy laws. These regulations are very much ...
Read moreRaising capital is about to get a bit easier for public companies. Starting November 21, 2022, public companies will be able to raise funds under a new prospectus exemption recently announced by the Canadian Securities Administrators. The Listed Issuer Financing Exemption under NI 45-106 uses a simplified offering document which avoids the cost and time ...
Read moreIntroduction In 2019, the World Economic Forum proudly announced that the time to achieve parity [1] had been reduced to 99.5 years (from 108 years in 2018). Fast-forward to the Covid-19 pandemic, in 2021, the time to close the gender gap has increased by one generation according to the World Economic Forum’s 2021 Annual Report ...
Read moreOn 28 December 2021, the National Market Regulation Administration, the National Tax Office, and three other authorities jointly issued the new Delisting Guidelines, which replace and supersede the previous version dated 2019. These guidelines outline the basic procedure for exiting the market. Details by Yaqin Niu from our Beijing office.
Read moreIn China, as in the EU and the US, merger control has potentially been a key step for cross-border mergers, acquisitions and joint ventures. As a concentration of economic operators can lead to a concentration of market power, economic operators must obtain merger approval from the Chinese Market Regulation Administration (the “SAMR”) for their proposed ...
Read moreIn the Web 3.0 era, the applications of NFTs are not limited to digital collections. China’s regulations on NFTs and other digital economies are different from others. Ziping Song from our Shanghai office introduces what NFTs are and presents the possible legal issues that can be encountered in the Chinese market.
Read moreThe year 2021 is a landmark year for data protection in China. After the Civil Code of the People’s Republic of China came into force earlier this year, the Data Security Law (“DSL”) and the Personal Information Protection Law (“PIPL”) were successively enacted, forming the legal framework for data protection in China. Our teams share ...
Read more[Labour Law] – WeChat is the most popular social network in China. It is used daily as a professional communication and management tool. It is also regularly used to manage attendance, send information and contracts, organise meetings, hold online meetings, etc. One of the recurring questions being asked is whether all of these WeChat conversations ...
Read more[Corporate Law] – Following a decree promulgated on December 28th, 2020, the State Council issued a revised regulation on registering business names (the “Provisions”). These Provisions have come into effect on March 1st, 2021, with the purpose of standardizing business name registration, protecting the legitimate rights and interests of enterprises, maintaining social and economic order, ...
Read moreOur teams decipher the current state of Chinese legislation on the delegation of power from the shareholders’ meeting (or general meeting) to the board of directors, by first recalling the respective powers of these two bodies.
Read moreData issues are likely to have been on the agenda of many companies operating in China since last year, particularly foreign-owned enterprises (“FIEs”). Since the enactment of China’s key data laws, namely the Data Security Law (“DSL”) and the Personal Information Protection Law (“PIPL”), additional measures and recommendations have been issued, providing a clearer picture ...
Read more[Patents] – Introduced in 1985 and revised three times, after eight years of discussions, the fourth revision of the Patent Law of the Republic of China will come into effect on 1 June 2021. Sylvie Savoie and Chen Xiaoyun present the main changes in this new version.
Read moreCompanies, if some of your employees are based in an area where you do not have a local legal structure, you may be using a third party company to pay their social contributions on your behalf. Please note that the use of the inter-provincial social contribution system does not comply with Chinese laws and regulations. ...
Read more[Income Tax] – Certain foreign senior executives, scientific or technical directors may qualify as high-level foreign talents and as such are eligible for a tax subsidy on their personal income Check your eligibility with Shunshan HE and Sylvie Savoie. Applications for the year 2020 can be submitted between July and August 2021. Detailed evaluation criteria ...
Read more[Employment Law] – The phenomena of employees abusing the litigation rights granted by Chinese laws and regulations to obtain “personal benefits” seems to have been regularly increasing. Isabel Moga Rella and Ding Yu present a case where a company dismissed an employee who had failed to meet the Company’s requirements in the first two months of ...
Read moreSecond newsletter of our series dedicated to Medical Devices Regulation in China further to the promulgation of the Regulations on Supervision and Administration of Medical Devices, which entered into force on June 1st, 2021. In this newsletter we will take a closer look at clinical evaluation and clinical trials. The 2021 Regulations encourages, through different ...
Read moreThird newsletter of our series dedicated to Medical Devices Regulation in China further to the promulgation of the Regulations on Supervision and Administration of Medical Devices, which entered into force on June 1st, 2021. We have previously looked at the broad outlines of the 2021 Regulation, before detailing the provisions on clinical evaluation and clinical ...
Read moreFourth (and final) newsletter of our series dedicated to Medical Devices Regulation in China further to the promulgation of the Regulations on Supervision and Administration of Medical Devices, which entered into force on June 1st, 2021. In this newsletter we focus on online sales of MDs and see what the regulatory requirements under the 2021 ...
Read more[Customs and international trade] – All companies that process, load and offload, transport, store or sell all types of goods imported into China must apply the provisions of Notice 17, the Protocol on Covid-19 Prevention and Control Mechanisms applicable to manufacturers and trade operators of goods imported into China. For cold-chain products, companies must refer to the even ...
Read moreOn 18 March 2021, the State Council promulgated the Regulations on Supervision and Administration of Medical Devices, which will take effect on 1st June 1st, 2021 (the “2021 Regulations”). Compared with the existing Regulations on Supervision and Administration of Medical Devices (lastly revised in 2017), the 2021 Regulations focuses more on innovation and development of ...
Read moreOn 10 June 2021, China adopted the Registration Fee Law, which will come into effect on 1 July 2022, and will replace the Provisional Registration Fee Regulations dated 6 August 1988. The new Law, while maintaining the general framework of the old registration fee system, simplifies and updates the taxable acts and tax rates. Decoding ...
Read more[Cosmetics] – A new Cosmetics Supervision and Administration Regulation simplifies the rules that apply to registering and controlling cosmetic products sold in China. This newsletter presents the main changes affecting cosmetics manufactured outside of China and imported into China for marketing purposes. The rules that apply to domestic cosmetics are slightly different to those that ...
Read moreIn order to encourage companies to voluntarily rectify their customs non-compliance, China’s General Administration of Customs has just issued new rules regarding administrative penalties normally applied to customs violations. These rules will be in effect from July 1, 2022 to December 31, 2023. Yijun Liu from our Shanghai office outlines in this brief what types ...
Read more2021 is a big year for data protection and cybersecurity, and in particular a milestone for the protection of personal information (“PI”). In addition to the well-known Data Security Law (“DSL”) and the Personal Information Protection Law (“PIPL”), there are also other regulations and guidelines already promulgated or in the pipeline, which may to some ...
Read moreThe Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress issued the new revised Production Security Law on 10 June 2021, which came into effect on 1 September 2021. The main objective of this New Production Safety Law is to improve the control and prevention of hazards in the workplace and to strengthen the penalties for violations ...
Read moreNowadays, many companies are beginning to realise the crucial importance of commercial and technical information for their business and development, so protecting business/commercial secrets is becoming a priority. Unfortunately, it appears that nearly 70% of the legal proceedings brought by companies against their former employees on the basis of a violation of business secrets are ...
Read more[Expert control] – The new regime will enter into force on December 1st, 2020 China engaged over the last few years a deep review of the regime it had initially set in 1990s. China will now implement a rather autonomous export control, intended to safeguard national security and interests and perform non-proliferation obligations. Control principles ...
Read more[Income Tax] – With the 1st of January 2022 quickly approaching, many employees are concerned about the potential abolishment of the current regime that allows for some benefits-in-kind to be exempt from tax. Will this regime actually be terminated as of 2022? How should we prepare? Sylvie Savoie and He Shunshan answer your questions and ...
Read moreJune 1, 2021 marks the first anniversary of the publication of the “Comprehensive Plan for the Construction of Hainan Free Trade Port (“HFTP”), which sets various goals to support the development of China’s southernmost island province. Summary of the main features and benefits of the Hainan FTP, taking into account recent developments and focusing on ...
Read moreAs a reminder, on 31 August 2018, the Chinese National Congress promulgated the Amendment to the PRC IIT Law (“IIT Amendment”) (cf. our Newsletter of 4 September 2018: China – Individual Income Tax Reform).
Read more[E-commerce] – Still unclear how to embark on a journey into Chinese e-commerce market? Still keep away from Chinese e-commerce? Liu Yimin and Zhang Beibei share strategies that allow you to start a business in China’s e-commerce market.
Read moreIn our newsletter we would like to inform you regularly about news and general information in the field of law and business in Europe and Germany in particular. We hope you find this useful and wish an enjoyable read! Recent developments and measures related to the coronavirus pandemic in the EU and Germany Further news related ...
Read moreIn our newsletter we would like to inform you regularly about news and general information in the field of law and business in Europe and Germany in particular. We hope you find this useful and wish an enjoyable read! Recent developments and measures related to the coronavirus pandemic in the EU and Germany Further news related ...
Read moreTo address the risk of personal data leakage, in 2021, China issued a series of laws, regulations and national standards on personal data: the Data Security Law and the Personal Information Protection Law (“PIPL”). The PIPL enshrines the sensitive data status of health data and sets certain requirements for the processing of sensitive data, but ...
Read moreSince the enactment of the Personal Information Protection Law (PIPL), enterprises anticipate that this new law may provide a solution to legitimize the cross-border transfer of personal information. According to item 2 of Article 38 of the PIPL, when a controller needs to transfer personal information outside of China, it may choose to obtain an ...
Read moreGood news for the franchise sector in Indonesia which revoked most of the previous regulations imposing requirements for the registration and operation of franchises.
Read moreWeb crawlers (web spiders, web robots) are programs or scripts that automatically browse a website, grab information and build an index. In our Data Economy, web crawlers permit companies to obtain and exploit large volumes of data which, once analyzed, can have a significant impact on their productivity and profitability. The question is: Can web ...
Read moreThe lawyers of the international law firm DS Avocats host blogs according to their legal specialties. Discover our blogs.
Read moreThe law firm DS Avocats ensures, in any case, that it only collects personal data that is appropriate, relevant and necessary for processing purposes (minimisation principle) and takes appropriate security and confidentiality measures to ensure its protection, including dealing with data protection issues from the outset and by default. DS Avocats undertakes to comply with the provisions of ...
Read moreClick here for news from our firm and our offices, as well as for our publications and invitations to a wide range of events across the world.
Read more