Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co, among India’s pre-eminent law firms, is built on a century of excellence.
As one of India’s marquee law firms, we help our clients grow, innovate and thrive. For over a century, we have built a reputation for our expertise, specialised solutions and the ability to think ahead. We find the most relevant and highly tailored solutions to our clients’ composite legal challenges.
With a constantly evolving legal, regulatory and business environment, we are determined to help our clients embrace change and stay ahead. Our multidisciplinary teams with global exposure and in-depth knowledge are frequently sought after by leading national and international organisations for qualitative, legal and business-critical advice.
Committed to investing in the brightest legal talent, the Firm has more than 761 lawyers who, with 159 partners, offer solutions across diverse practice areas for industries, the central government and states, regulatory bodies, industry chambers and non-profit organisations. Our offices are spread across New Delhi, Mumbai, Gurgaon, Bengaluru, Chennai, Ahmedabad and Kolkata.
We deliver original and exceptional solutions in the fields of mergers & acquisitions, tax, competition law, dispute resolution & arbitration, regulatory litigation, capital markets and private equity practices. We are an exclusive member firm of Lex Mundi in India, which helps clients access our partner network across more than 125 countries.
Our General Corporate Practice is the bedrock of our Firm, owing to its position as the largest practice domain for Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co. With a strength of 373 lawyers, including over 73 Partners, we offer clients a full range of legal services.
We understand that in a fast changing environment, what remains constant for our clients, is the quest for growth. A continuously evolving business environment necessitates reading between the lines, understand the impact stemming from disruptive changes and respond with solutions that mitigate risks and maximise opportunities. Our lawyers are ahead of the curve and work back with clients on enhancing value for their businesses through a full spectrum of services. Our decades of experience at the heart of the industry sectors including insurance, real estate, technology, media and telecom amongst others, positions us effectively to help you adapt to the fast evolving landscape and make the most of the opportunities it brings.
We advise clients on every aspect of their business, from entry strategies and complex tax efficient structuring to divestitures and exits. It also includes our engagements regarding complicated mergers, acquisitions, private equity transactions, takeover code, corporate governance and employee related matters. Additionally, we regularly advise on regulatory and compliance related issues such as matters involving Foreign Exchange Management Act, and those requiring approvals from the Reserve Bank of India, the Foreign Investment Promotion Board and the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs.
Our lawyers have been a part of some of the most innovative and headline private equity and merger and acquisition transactions for many decades. They are highly regarded by their peers and by various reputed domestic and international ranking guides alike.
Our Strengths
The pooling of our multi-disciplinary resources across our various practices delivers a seamless experience while enabling a deal, an aspect that puts us in a highly credible position with our clients. Tax implications of the deal structure, approvals from the Competition Commission of India and intellectual property protection is critical in every merger and acquisition, JV or a private equity deal. Our tax, competition law, intellectual property and regulatory teams collaborate closely with the General Corporate team to deliver deals seamlessly.
Areas of Focus
Merger and Acquisition
Driving inorganic growth through M&A remains a quick and efficient way to transform business or gain advantage in new business areas. Whether it be a need to shed redundancies and focus on core businesses or acquire advantage speedily through expansion, M&A remains a preferred route for profitability, despite economic fluctuations. But it brings in its wake, concerns around merger clearances, whether it be post-merger complications or potential risks related to compliance.
Our highly sought after M&A practice works with our clients to address and resolve such concerns. Acknowledged as leaders in mergers & acquisitions, amalgamations, restructurings, demergers, delistings, joint ventures, public M&A and asset transfers, our M&A team offers a comprehensive range of services. We play a pivotal role for international companies wishing to acquire existing businesses in India, or Indian companies wishing to acquire businesses within or outside India, through a comprehensive range of services, including advice on related regulatory issues.
Private Equity
Our Private Equity practice is highly sought after by clients, both existing and potential. We have delivered innovative, focussed and efficient strategies to culminate some of the most complex, structured and massive private equity deals for our clients across various industries. We advise some of the largest private equity and sovereign wealth funds in the world on their minority investments and buyout transactions in India. We have represented buyers and sellers of both private and public companies across many industries and at every stage of the investment cycle.
Joint Ventures and Collaboration
We appreciate that every JV and business alliance is distinctive and requires a tailored approach. Our deep insights into market trends and wide domain expertise helps investors secure deals with the right terms to minimise risk and build portfolio value. We guide and assist our clients in developing optimum structures for joint ventures and collaborations and negotiating various agreements etc. across all sectors.
Real Estate
Our Real Estate practice has earned international repute and is built on a deep understanding of real estate assets. Our sector knowledge and collaborative approach anchors problem solving to clients’ most pressing issues, as we understand that real estate assets are an important aspect to deliver your business strategy. We assist clients in matters relating to land and property acquisitions, development of land parcels, structuring of FDI in real estate, commercial leasing, and setting up diverse assets such as multi-specialty hospital & hotel projects, development of townships and SEZs, etc.
Insurance
Being a complex and highly regulated industry sector, many aspects of the insurance sector stay firmly in the regulatory spotlight, requiring precise clarity in navigating through any changes impacting the business. With vast experience in all aspects of insurance law and practice in India, our team advises clients on entry strategies and licensing of new ventures, regulatory compliances, product development (life, general and health), coverage issues, insurance claims, joint ventures, acquisitions and increasing of equity to permissible limits in existing insurance companies.
Employment
Employment issues are not just about legal aspects but also cultural nuances and we understand that. These issues require an understanding of your business and your people. That’s why, we merge our technical expertise with interpersonal skills to develop the most practical solutions that address issues while building trust and confidence.
We advise our clients on various employment law related issues such as hiring and termination of employees, creation of employee trusts, stock option schemes, and benefits and policies affecting employees, social security related issues, sexual harassment at workplace and women’s safety.
Technology, Media and Telecom
The Technology, Media and Telecom sector is dynamic, witnessing disruptive changes driven by new emerging technologies. These are accompanied by continuously evolving regulations taking shape to support the ecosystem. We understand the digital economy and our lawyers are ahead of the curve.
We provide a range of customised legal services to connect with the business needs that cater to the developments in the dynamic TMT industry. Our extensive client list includes both Indian and foreign telecom service providers, satellite operators, companies involved in the mobile phone business, communications equipment manufacturers, operators of advanced fibre optic cable systems, and cable television companies & networks.
The law relating to Insolvency and Bankruptcy in India has continuously been evolving and undergone a paradigm shift. Our specialised teams are in tune with the present and expected trends. It has also been a constituent of the policy making process for this domain.
Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co has been at the forefront of the new insolvency law, and has been involved in almost all major cases of insolvency under the new law. The Firm continues to play an active role in shaping the constantly evolving insolvency law and policy in India.
Our experience covers the entire range of this practice, starting from restructuring under formal and informal procedures towards revival for corporates with early signs of distress, to processes involving actual liquidation and winding down of businesses. We advise clients at the pre insolvency stage or during the corporate insolvency resolution process (advising the committee of creditors or the resolution professional), to acquisition of the stressed asset via an insolvency process. Our integrated approach comprehensively addresses diverse aspects of an insolvency matter including acquisitions, deal structuring, drafting the resolution plan, conducting legal due diligence, conducting meetings with resolution professionals to address concerns and clarify queries. We also represent before the National Company Law Tribunal on behalf of the acquirer to see the matter through to its conclusion.
Mr. Shardul Shroff, Executive Chairman of the Firm, leads our highly regarded and diversified insolvency and bankruptcy practice. He has played a leading role in shaping the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, as a member of the Insolvency Law Committee constituted by the Government of India to review the implementation of the code. He has also been a member of other committees including the drafting sub-committee of the Insolvency Law Committee, the cross-border insolvency committee (headed by Injeti Srinivas, Secretary, Ministry of Corporate Affairs, Government of India) and the Eradi Committee involved in the insolvency provisions of the Companies Act, 1956.
Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co guides its clients to the most efficient and practical solutions in diverse bankruptcy situations with varying degree of complexity and stakes. Our extensive experience in representing creditors, distressed corporates, as well as acquirers in the acquisition of companies in insolvency through a ‘resolution plan’ equips us in handholding clients through the entire process.
We have considerable experience in representing acquirers, stressed assets funds, international and domestic banks and financial institutions, trading and finance companies, lenders, issuers, and borrowers in diverse banking and financing transactions. We are frequently involved in structuring, documenting, recovery litigation, asset control and asset reconstruction, debt recovery, and negotiating various secured and unsecured financing transactions. We have dedicated resources for providing seamless advice on Indian laws in relation to cross-border aspects of contentious and non-contentious issues of insolvencies, formal restructurings and out-of-court settlements.
Our Bankruptcy and Restructuring Practice works closely with other practice areas within the Firm, primarily Banking & Finance, M&A, Tax, Employment and Dispute Resolution, to provide a comprehensive solution encompassing financial restructuring and recovery, insolvency, corporate reorganisation, restructuring of non-performing assets, creditors’ rights, and contingent preparedness against any peripheral litigation. Our full service experience enables the Firm to provide clients with commercially relevant legal advice and create viable safeguards to protect their business.
As the global and domestic economy grows and becomes interconnected, it is leading to tighter regulatory oversight, higher accountability standards and intense competition. The interplay of these dynamics creates challenges that can test the resolve and slow down the progress of organisations, creating higher costs and liabilities, requiring that disputes are best avoided and addressed effectively and efficiently, should they arise.
We are uniquely positioned to provide counsel on these issues and represent our clients in cross-border litigation, international arbitration and investigations. Litigation is the crucible on which all transactions are finally put to test and we at Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co recognise this, delivering a comprehensive range of services that are anchored on the proven expertise of our robust and highly reputed corporate commercial Dispute Resolution practice, with over 162 dispute lawyers that includes 27 partners. The team is led by senior litigators who are acknowledged leaders in their field, many of whom have over twenty years’ of experience at the bar.
We have deep experience in representing domestic clients before the Supreme Court of India, various High Courts and Tribunals in India. Our lawyers have acted in numerous landmark cases involving complex legal nuances of law that have contributed to the development of jurisprudence in India.
We also have significant experience in representing clients in both domestic and international arbitrations, having seat in India and abroad, including London, Paris, Dubai, Chicago, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, The Hague, and Stockholm. Our expertise spans across diverse sectors and industries, including Financial Services, Banking, Telecom, Construction, Energy, Heavy Industries, Oil & Gas, Infrastructure, Pharmaceuticals, F&B, Media and Information Technology, amongst others. Our range of clients include domestic, public sector, international, private equity and banking clients, among others.
Areas of Focus
With insights into the legal and regulatory environment, culture, and way of doing business wherever our clients operate, we deliver outcomes that alleviate disruption for our clients. Our full spectrum of services include dispute avoidance, strategic advice, pre-litigation/litigation service and enforcement.
Our Approach
Litigation is all about “strategy”. It is about cutting edge planning, translating into practical solutions that synchronise with the objectives of the client at every stage of litigation and dispute resolution.
Working in seamless collaboration and harnessing the full potential of our other practices across the Firm is an advantage we bring to bear for our clients and that sets us apart. We work closely with other practice areas including General Corporate, Competition Law, Tax and Intellectual Property to develop compliance programmes and perform risk assessments to reduce clients’ overall litigation exposure.
Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas (SAM & Co) is recognised as one of the leading law firms in India for international and domestic arbitration. We have a specialised Arbitration Practice Group consisting of members with extensive experience and expertise in handling all phases of complex commercial and treaty arbitrations, including advising on negotiation strategy, developing dispute resolution plans, drafting pleadings, conducting arbitration hearings and, where necessary, seeking resource from courts, including in respect of appointment of arbitrators, grant of interim relief, challenge and enforcement of arbitration awards.
We have successfully handled various arbitrations involving virtually every major industry, including oil & gas, private equity, real estate, infrastructure and shipping. Our client base includes international giants like GE, JP Morgan, Standard & Poor, Brookfield, Abertis Infrastructures, Danone, CVRD (Vale), Vodafone and Suzuki Motor Corporation and large Indian corporates like ONGC Videsh Ltd., NTPC, GSFC, BHEL and Videocon.
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Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas is one of the very few Tier I Law Firms in India that has a comprehensive White Collar Crime, Internal Investigations and Compliance practice.
The opening of the Indian economy, the evolution of the Indian business and regulatory regime with a strong emphasis on transparency and disclosure coupled with strict enforcement of anti-corruption laws across the world has led to an exponential increase in investigations and prosecutions related to white collar crimes and economic offences. With both civil society and the courts shunning corrupt practices, India has seen an exponential surge in scams and investigations in the last decade. The growth in complexity and scale of white collar crimes in India and the amendments to Indian anti-corruption laws has made it critical for companies doing business in India to establish adequate procedures to ensure their businesses are compliant with increasingly stringent Indian and international regulations. The long arm of the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and the UK Bribery Act (UKBA), and the vigorous enforcement of the Indian anti-corruption laws by courts in India have made both domestic companies doing business in the US, UK and India, and the Indian subsidiaries of US and UK companies extremely conscious of strict compliance requirements under those laws.
Services We Offer
Our White Collar Crime, Internal Investigations and Compliance practice offers the full range of services like advising in relation to Indian laws relating to fraud, anti-money laundering, anti-corruption and anti-bribery, employee misconduct, procurement malpractices and other business crimes, discovering the existence of an offence, determining the strategy to be followed, and finally pursuing it to its logical end before a court in India and representing clients in various regulatory investigations and prosecutions. The practice, inter alia, also includes:
Our practice also includes, inter alia, the following with respect to specific focus on dispute services:
Whether ideas, products or brands, these Intellectual Property assets face growing infringement threat stemming from sophisticated use of technology by infringers, owing to the competitive advantage that businesses enjoy on building and owning these assets. We understand these challenges and offer services across the full life cycle of protecting intellectual property.
We assist through a comprehensive range of services including patents, trademarks, copyrights, designs and other allied laws. The spectrum ranges from conceptualisation to enforcement and from negotiations to creation of complex corporate structures based on intellectual property. We specialise in identifying intellectual properties and advising on the spectrum of protection that is available for it under Indian law.
Search and Analysis
We specialise in conducting searches for patents that may offend the scope of one’s own property or keep a standing watch on activities of competitors. Analysis of results are critical and this is also where we provide value to our clients. The different types of patents and non-patents searches in which we specialise are patentability search, patent validity/invalidity search, Freedom to Operate (FTO) search, infringement search, State of the Art Search, and patent landscape search.
We have extensive experience in a variety of technology domains including software, electronics, telecommunications, wireless communication technologies, semiconductors, biomedical devices, pharmaceuticals and petrochemical, chemical, electrical, and mechanical engineering. We also assist in conducting trademark clearance searches, imbibing an understanding of the importance of adoption and inception of trademarks to business. We render our advice based on both the legal principles as well as our experience in handling prosecution. We help businesses make the best decisions for their company that is not limited to merely reporting the results.
Drafting
Where a creation/invention is found to be a fit subject matter for a patent, several specialised and skilled resources are required to ensure proper protection. A specification and claims to scope require drafting which itself is a specialised activity and requires a thorough understanding of laws of major jurisdictions, forming precedents in India. Our patent attorneys identify, draft and prosecute patent applications in the fields of software, electronics, telecommunications, wireless communication technologies, semiconductors, biomedical devices, pharmaceuticals, and petrochemical, chemical, electrical, and mechanical engineering. For trademark aspects, we regularly assist our clients in drafting specification for goods and services that adequately covers the existing and future business areas, while ensuring optimal protection.
Filing and Procedure – Prosecution
We have vast experience in the prosecution of patent and trademark applications before the Patent Offices and Trademarks’ Registry across all facets of technology and business. We represent overseas and Indian clients in all four patent offices (Chennai, Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai) and five Trademarks Registries (Ahmedabad, Chennai, Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai) in India. Prosecution, maintenance of trademarks and patents and post registration/grant requirements are generally managed from our office in Delhi, and matters are effectively handled and concluded in all jurisdictions.
Several international conventions have been signed by India, particularly relevant in the context of patent and trademark procedures are the Paris Convention, the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) and the Budapest Treaty. Each of these essentially provide mechanisms and procedures for filing and prosecution. Our intellectual property attorneys fully appreciate the width that these procedures afford and use them to provide maximum flexibility for our clients. We track all the deadlines electronically and advise clients well in time for pending actionable items.
Contentious – Opposition and Cancellation Actions
We have extensive experience in handling contentious proceedings such as oppositions and cancellations before the Patents Office, Trademarks Registry and the Intellectual Property Appellate Board. Such proceedings require deft handling of not just IP issues and procedure but an overall knowledge of handling evidence and civil procedure. Our lawyers are adept and highly experienced in handling such proceedings.
Protecting IP Overseas
Selection of jurisdiction is a crucial activity since failure to protect could mean loss of property rights in the omitted jurisdiction. We advise our clients in selection of foreign jurisdictions in which protection should be sought by assisting them in addressing issues such as scope of protection, intention to exploit, and position of law in aspects such as obligation to work and compulsory licensing. For obtaining and enforcing intellectual property rights, we work with a robust network of law firms who have been carefully selected based on their capabilities and reasonable fee structure.
We also have a network of counsels in the Asian subcontinent who address patent and trademark applications and prosecution matters for overseas clients in Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore and Maldives. Similarly, the Firm represents Indian clients in their efforts to obtain patent, design and trademark registrations in other jurisdictions, particularly the US, EU, Middle East, South East Asia and Japan.
IP Enforcement and Litigation
Intellectual property enforcement and litigation forms an integral and important component of our IP Practice. We handle intellectual property litigation matters in courts in India involving patent and design infringement, trademark infringement; trade dress and trade name violations, passing off, copyright, and other forms of intellectual property violations including protection of confidential information and domain name disputes.
Pre-litigation advice and formation of strategy is of significant importance in achieving the desired results and being cost effective. Conducting investigations (through chosen private investigators) for collection of information and evidence, assessing the strength of evidence and providing strategic counsel on the approach to litigation is an integral part of our practice and we appreciate the needs of our corporate clients to have such strategy in place well before any action is initiated.
We do realise the importance of negotiations in obtaining the desired results and favourable settlements on behalf of our clients. Drafting and serving effective legal notices, chasing the misusers, obtaining undertakings to bring effective closure are all part of larger strategy we specialise in, and we bring a cost effective and assertive way of tracking misuse and violations.
Licensing and Transactions involving IP
We work extensively in transfer of technology transactions, both on behalf of the licensor and licensee, and therefore are in a position to offer advice from both perspectives. We routinely advise clients in structuring of franchises, on transactions involving sale of trademarks along with other assets, licensing of content, software development agreements, technology transfers and patent and know-how licenses. Complex issues of ownership and documentation arise where parties undertake collaborative efforts. We do not believe in offering our clients off-the-shelf legal products but use our own creative resources to customise deals. Other aspects such as those relating to trade secrets are carefully attended to in view of the developing case law in India.
IP Audits and Due Diligence
We are equipped to carry out intellectual property audits for our clients wherein we would, in addition to other aspects, look into the documentation of the existing portfolio, uncover unprotected intellectual properties that clients may be interested in securing protection for, review documents of ownership, suggest structures and procedures to be adopted to minimise loss of intellectual assets, and equip management to take decisions on leveraging its intellectual property.
Advocacy
We actively engage in policy and regulatory work in India on behalf of many of our clients in the area of IP laws. We work closely with industry chambers in putting together briefs for future reforms. In partnership with industry and government, we have been closely involved in shaping regulatory policy and spearheading legal reforms in India including the laws relating to data theft and the existence of cartels.
