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Nicholas (Nick) Chan is an experienced private equity/venture capital, merger and acquisition, commercial and compliance, TMT, employment, competition and regulatory lawyer with a computer science background and a regional practice covering 22 countries. He focuses on the telecommunications, broadcasting, information and emerging technologies, healthcare, aviation, energy, real estate, entertainment, advertising, logistics, global sourcing, petroleum and related industries. His expertise has been recognized in AsiaLaw Leading Lawyers since 2004. Most recently recognizing his expertise and leadership in the areas of venture capital and private equity; mergers and acquisitions; intellectual property (IP); IT, media and telecommunications; competition and antitrust; corporate governance; general corporate practice; labor and employment; and regulatory and government. He was also recognized in Who’s Who Legal 2014 and The International Who's Who of Regulatory Communications Lawyers 2011. Nick is also the recipient of the 2012 International Law Office (ILO) Client Choice Award, the Law Society of Hong Kong Pro Bono Award and was chosen one of the ASIAN-MENA Counsel’s 2013 External Counsel of the Year.
Nick is the lead FCPA in-house lawyer for a Fortune 100 company in North Asia and has led numerous FCPA investigations in Greater China. He is an anticorruption speaker on FCPA at an in-house counsel forum in Asia. Nick is also advisor to Fortune 500 companies on FCPA, UK Anti-Bribery Act and corresponding anticorruption laws in China and Hong Kong.
Nick regularly advises governments, private sector clients, funds and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) on projects in Australia, Canada, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, United Kingdom, United States and Vietnam relating to fund formation; multibillion-dollar mergers and acquisitions and debt financing; fund raising; MBOs and LMBOs; private equity and venture capital investments, operations and exits; debt factoring and acquisitions; cleantech projects; outsourcing projects; PIPEs; social networking projects; frequency spectrum allocation and licensing for WiFi, WiMax and BWA projects; content acquisition and distribution networks; submarine cable projects; satellite operations and distribution projects; data centers; competition law; e-commerce, m-commerce and i-gaming projects; IP commercialization, cross-licensing, patent pools and enforcements; restructuring and work-outs; risk management; calling card operations; capacity swaps; convergence; global sourcing projects distributorships; life science projects; and government lobbying.
Nick offers practical solutions which he largely accredits to his in-house experience on secondment as regional counsel at AT&T and as regional counsel with lead responsibility for Cisco Systems in North Asia. Nick is the proud recipient of the AT&T Asia/Pacific President’s Award, AT&T’s highest performance award. Nick also worked in London on secondment and has completed special courses and programs in China.
Nick’s recent works have been published in China Law & Practice and Hong Kong Lawyer, the official journal of The Law Society of Hong Kong. He regularly contributes to World Bank studies and has a legal column in SingTao, one of the leading Chinese language newspapers. His most recent major publication is an authoritative book titled Competition Law in Singapore – Principles, Practice and Procedure, published by LexisNexis in 2007.
Nick frequently appears in print as well as on radio and television programs. He has been interviewed on NOW TV’s primetime business and current affairs program, speaking on IP laws, privacy laws and media content regulation. He has spoken at international conferences in Australia, China, Hong Kong, Taipei, Malaysia, Moscow, Singapore, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States. He led a panel of business leaders and experts in discussing opportunities and challenges for the financing and operations of data centers at an international date center conference. As a speaker at Asian Legal Business’ “Legal Workshop” in 2008, Nick trained in-house counsels and lawyers in private practice on responding to legal and business developments in the telecommunications, data privacy and protection, and information technology industries in Hong Kong and mainland China. At an IT Masterclass hosted by LexisNexis, Nick trained lawyers and procurement managers from multinational corporations and the government on launching and negotiating large scale tender projects. Speaking at an IP conference in Moscow, he provided training on how Russia-based businesses can take full advantage of the new IP laws in Russia, and protect innovations. In 2007 and 2008 Nick was a featured speaker at more than two dozen seminars and conferences and also guest lectured at business schools. He has addressed a wide range of subjects including implications of an amendment to the Copyright Ordinance to the creative industry, the introduction of competition laws in Hong Kong and China, e-commerce and m-commerce, triple-play in China, antispam laws, e-marketing opportunities, and the practical and legal aspects of China’s new labor laws. Nick has also spoken on venture capital and private equity trends and issues in Asia at the Dow Jones Venture One Conference in San Francisco. He was a guest speaker on “Justice for All,” a popular primetime educational television program on the rights and obligations of parties under Hong Kong law. At the invitation of the Metro Broadcast Corporation and The Law Society of Hong Kong, he discussed legal proceedings targeting individual music file-sharers in Hong Kong, peer-to-peer sharing and rights of the recording industry and Internet service providers on a radio broadcast. He was interviewed by, and featured in, the Economic Digest for his views on how to pursue opportunities and manage risks in a volatile market place. Nick was recently featured by a DAB radio station, where he offered practical advice and tips on SMEs.
His speaking engagements include speaking in Moscow on “Formulating Your Intellectual Property Rights Strategy for China”, in Hong Kong on “IT Contracts Master Class”, “Negotiating Contracts – Practical Guide”, “Competition Laws and Data Privacy Laws in China and the HKSAR”, and “Lessons Learned From the Criminal Case in Hong Kong Against Bank Employees Involving the Shanghai Land Case”, “Risk Management and the Negotiations of Licensing/Manufacturing Contracts in the Medical and Healthcare Industry” at the Conference on the Hong Kong Medical and Healthcare Device Industry; in Taiwan on “Opportunities, Challenges and Developments in Taiwan’s Market Post-WTO” at the Fifth Taiwan Telecoms International Summit; in Beijing on “Blueprint for MII’s Post-WTO Telecom Competition Framework with Special Emphasis on the Satellite Market” for the Global VSAT Forum and China’s Ministry of Information Industry; in Singapore on “Globalization and Harmonization of Competition Laws, International Conflicts and Cooperation, and their Implications for Singapore” with the Singapore Ministry of Trade and Industries; and “Doing Business in China” at the Gateway to China Conference. Nick has guest lectured on competition laws and opportunities before executives of the dominant fixed-line operator in China at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is a member of the Hong Kong Institute of Arbitrators and the East Asia Branch of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators.
In 2013, the Hong Kong Food and Health Bureau appointed Nick on a government board in pro bono personal capacity to help vet and approve organ transplant surgeries in Hong Kong. Nick serves as the honorary legal adviser to the AAPEG Hong Kong Baptist University, MILESAA Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong Aviation Industry Association (HKAIA), Hong Kong Association of Interactive Marketing, Hong Kong Internet Service Providers Association (HKISPA), Hong Kong Information Technology Federation (HKITF), International Federation of Creativity and Technology (IFOCAT) Modernized Chinese Medicine International Association (MCMIA) and Hong Kong Medical and Healthcare Devices Industries Association (KHMHDIA). He is an ambassador for the Hong Kong Tourism Board. Nick serves on the HKSAR Government Passport Appeal Board, HKSAR Government Indecent and Obscene Articles Tribunal, Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal and the Knowledge Transfer Committee for the Council of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. He served as vice chair of the Federation of Australian Alumni Associations. Nick serves the Hong Kong Government Central Policy Unit as representative of The Law Society of Hong Kong.
He also serves on the competition law and data privacy committees to guide The Law Society and its members on the formulation, introduction and evolution of competition laws and data privacy laws in Hong Kong.
- Assisting in a US$10 billion acquisition of a global networking business including assets and employees in more than 50 countries.
- Participating in a US$8 billion submarine cable network project.
- Counseling in a US$7 billion global joint venture merging all international operations of two of the world’s largest telecommunications companies.
- Advising on a US$300 million buyout and privatization of a publicly listed company on the Thailand stock exchange.
- Advising on a US$100 million regional Internet data center project.
- Advising on a US$90 million private equity investment to a household appliances retailer in mainland China.
- Participating in a US$45 million lawsuit regarding international refile and call forwarding arrangements.
- Advising on various multimillion-dollar loan and securitization projects.
- Creating a draft domain name dispute resolution policy for one of the world’s leading dispute resolution centers.
- Collaborating with a UK-based antispam agency to negotiate and obtain funding from the Hong Kong government to operate a multimillion-dollar and multiyear antispam project involving website classification and filtering technology.
- Advising clients on protection of data transmission under constitutional law, applicable laws and codes, and telecommunications licensing conditions in Hong Kong.
- Advising NGOs, multinational companies and individuals on the existence, scope, operation and enforcement of personal data privacy laws and data protection laws including restrictions on data matching; transfer of data outside of jurisdiction; and purpose of collection, use, correction and destruction of data.
- Drafting terms and conditions that include account data protection and privacy law principles.
- Conducting surveys of major government, private sector and NGO companies to identify organizational and technological measures being taken in selected countries and states and assessing the information based on effectiveness.
- Identifying measures taken by the government to remedy breaches of the legal provisions relating to trust and privacy by service providers, network operators, equipment and software providers, and by third parties using these providers.
- Advising on self-regulatory measures regarding security of networks, equipment, online services and measures aimed at ensuring privacy of information transferred over networks using different types of services.
- Providing regional advice for major Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and US fixed, wireless, satellite and Internet companies on commercial, employment, trademark, outsourcing, domain name registrations, regulatory issues and the use of broadband.
- Advising governments and telecommunications authorities in formulating and revising interconnection access, data privacy protection, e-commerce and competition laws including drafting of a reference interconnection offer.
- Advising e-casinos and e-clearance websites on operations.
- Assisting a government agency in establishing its business policy and intellectual property retention and licensing program to bridge university research, entrepreneurship and commercial exploitation.
- Assisting telecommunications regulators with initiatives to revise and formulate their Type II interconnection and local loop unbundling policy, competition policies and laws.
- Assisting in a global frequency spectrum allocation project for a multibillion-dollar wireless broadband project covering more than 40 countries.
Education
- The Australian National University, Graduate Diploma, with merit, 1997
- The University of Melbourne, LL.B., 1996
- The University of Melbourne, B.Sc., 1996
- East China University of Political Science and Law, Certificate of Completion, 1996
Admissions
- England and Wales (non-practicing), 2007
- High Court of Hong Kong, 1999
Courts
- Supreme Ct. of Victoria
- High Court of Australia
- Supreme Ct. of Australian Capital Territory
Languages
- Chinese (Cantonese)
- Chinese (Mandarin, also known as Putonghua)
- English