Asia

With the opening of its Hong Kong office in 1980, Cleary Gottlieb has a longer history in Asia than most other international law firms.

Our clients benefit from the intimate knowledge of local law and business custom our lawyers bring to every transaction. With offices in Hong Kong, Beijing and Seoul and over 60 resident lawyers, many of whom are fluent in Chinese or Korean in addition to English, our Asia practice handles the largest and most innovative transactions both for clients based in Asia and those doing business in the region.

We provide clients with fully integrated U.S., English and Hong Kong law advice in a range of practice areas, including mergers and acquisitions, private equity, private funds, capital markets, sovereign debt, leveraged finance and antitrust, in all of the core Asian markets, including China, Hong Kong, Korea, South and Southeast Asia.

A pioneer from the outset, Cleary continues its enterprising tradition in Asia with a number of landmark transactions, including representation of clients in:

• First major private equity foreign investment in the financial sector in Korea.
• First cross-border public tender offer in both the United States and Singapore.
• Formation of the two largest Asia-focused private equity funds.
• One of the largest take-private transactions of companies listed in Hong Kong.
• Establishment of one of the first renminbi-denominated funds in China.
• First Chinese “panda” bond offering by a sovereign government.
• First Russian IPO in Hong Kong.
• Representing Korea, Indonesia and the Philippines in restructurings and privatizations.

Hong Kong Law Practice

A key distinction of our global practice is the integration of our international lawyers with a strong local law practice in many of our offices. We have approximately 20 Hong Kong-qualified solicitors who work closely with our international lawyers to deliver integrated U.S., Hong Kong, and English legal services seamlessly to our clients. The practice focuses on Hong Kong-listed IPOs and other capital markets transactions, as well as private equity and M&A transactions, and general corporate and compliance advice.