Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, LLP

INTERNATIONAL PRACTICE

Strategically Positioned to Help Clients Take Advantage of Growing Markets

A global economy and growing overseas opportunities—especially in the resource-rich regions of Asia and Latin America—mean that more companies are setting up operations abroad. To help clients take advantage of significant international business opportunities, Manatt’s International Practice provides a wealth of experience in complex finance matters, cross-border commerce, investment and securities transactions, and financial restructuring. Our team provides the insight and creativity necessary to assist clients in identifying and implementing solutions to the challenges of creating, maximizing and preserving growth and value.

Our attorneys are trained in both the common and civil law legal systems of the countries in which our clients do business, and the team includes former senior diplomats and government officials. Working seamlessly with top-tier local counsel to provide our clients with efficient and comprehensive legal representation, we have helped clients across a broad range of industry sectors successfully navigate the international legal, business and political issues affecting businesses today. Recent work includes assisting clients in the financial services, alternative energy, entertainment, media, telecommunications, manufacturing, transportation and aerospace sectors.

We have experience in many areas throughout the world, including Argentina, Australia, Brazil, British Virgin Islands, Canada, Cayman Islands, Chile, China, Colombia, Dominican Republic, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Netherlands, Peru, Singapore, Taiwan and the United Kingdom. Our cross-border commerce and transactional experience has been particularly successful for companies looking to take advantage of business opportunities with companies in other markets—especially in what is shaping up to be the new strategic triangle of the United States, Asia and Latin America.

Manatt’s clients share the advantage of access to the firm’s strategic consulting division, ManattJones Global Strategies, a team of professionals with extensive international business and advocacy experience established by former U.S. Ambassadors Charles Manatt and James Jones. ManattJones understands the communities, cultures and businesses of Latin America, the Caribbean and Asia.

At the Center of the U.S.-Asia-Latin America Strategic Triangle

Smart companies today are triangulating their strategies to gain a competitive advantage in capturing new markets, capital and technology within the United States, Asia and Latin America—and Manatt’s International Practice has been in the center of the action. For example, working with Brazil’s former Vice Minister of Trade, Manatt is serving as a top strategist for complex infrastructure and financial transactions involving Chinese companies in Brazil, as well as Brazilian ethanol and entertainment companies seeking capital in the United States to finance domestic Brazilian transactions. Furthermore, our guidance has helped U.S. green companies use early wins in Brazil to create the momentum to enter the Chinese market.

Doing Business in Asia Is Not Business as Usual

The economic region that is Asia—particularly China, Korea, Taiwan and Japan—is an engine of growth providing substantial opportunities for companies in both the East and West. Those opportunities are reflected in the scope and breadth of business that is currently conducted throughout Asia, which is expected to grow significantly in the future.

Differences in the political, legal and regulatory framework in Asian nations, however, create complexities for companies seeking to do business there. Without proper counsel, those complexities can delay or even prevent domestic companies from successfully engaging in Asian business. Only through a thorough understanding of these issues, as well as in-depth experience dealing with the unique cultural differences in Asia, can companies maximize their ability to successfully do business with their Asian counterparts. The attorneys making up Manatt’s International Practice bring unique insight, experience and knowledge to the firm’s Asian practice, enabling our clients to take advantage of the significant business opportunities presented in Asia.

Fluent in the many languages and cultures of Asia, we work in Mandarin, Korean, Japanese and Cantonese. Our team regularly handles complex cross-border investment, acquisition, financial and commercial transactions, as well as securities and lending matters into and out of the leading economic markets in Asia. We focus on addressing complex problems and assisting clients with high-stakes situations, including significant merger and acquisition transactions and crisis situations for both international financial institutions and distressed companies.

Protecting Foreign Intellectual Property (IP) Rights in China 

We use a unique systematic approach to protecting our clients’ intellectual property—including patents, trademarks, copyrights and trade secrets—in China. Manatt attorneys have developed a legal and business framework to support innovative collaborations between Chinese and foreign companies, including licensing, cross-licensing, identification and acquisition of patent portfolios, collaborative intelligence, open source regimes, strategic joint IP portfolio development, including megapatents and IP insurance. This is especially timely given the trillions of dollars China is committing beginning in 2012 to support its economically strategic industries, indigenous innovation, technology transfer, new IP regimes, and overseas direct investment. Although Manatt's strategic approach is a general application, the Manatt team is focusing on the following joint strategic sectors between China and the United States: clean technology and alternative energy, next-generation information technologies, biological industries, pharmaceuticals, high-end equipment manufacturing, electric automobiles and new materials.

Navigating the Vibrant Market in Latin America

China and India may have been getting much of the attention from businesses and investors over the past few years, but Latin America has quietly become a market to watch. In many Latin American countries, economic and political reforms have strengthened and expanded opportunities in a variety of industries. Having a partner with an established presence in the region and the diverse capabilities to handle both the challenges and opportunities is key to doing business in Latin America.

The attorneys in Manatt’s Latin America Practice have extensive experience representing clients in sophisticated transactions and disputes in or involving Latin American jurisdictions. We have been actively involved in numerous complex cross-border finance, corporate, commercial, investment and securities transactions, as well as financial restructurings throughout the region. Handling matters with insight and creativity, our attorneys assist clients in identifying and implementing solutions for creating, maximizing and preserving value in all types of projects in Latin America.

The strength of our Latin America Practice is based on the talent and experience of our people. The team’s varied backgrounds include attorneys with substantive knowledge of and experience with the civil law legal systems of the various countries within Latin America, as well as former senior diplomats and government officials who understand the intricacies of the local social, business and political cultures. Fluent in the languages of the region, our seasoned professionals have cultivated deep and long-standing relationships with legal professionals, business leaders and government officials in nearly every country throughout Latin America. These relationships provide an advantage to our clients when helping them manage challenges as well as maximize and protect business opportunities in the region.

Operating from New York, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles, with support from ManattJones in Mexico City and São Paulo, our attorneys have handled all types of corporate, financial and commercial matters—including mergers and acquisitions, securities, lending and investments—as well as sophisticated cross-border workout and financial restructuring matters throughout Latin America. In addition, we have addressed crisis situations for both international financial institutions and challenged companies doing business in Latin American countries.

Solving International Tax and Compensation Challenges

Globalization is creating a challenging tax environment for companies as they expand their operations around the globe. Manatt’s international tax professionals counsel domestic and foreign corporations, partnerships and individuals on a broad range of international tax matters to help minimize global tax costs. We provide innovative structuring of clients’ international transactions and operations—such as the use of tax treaties, conduit entities or hybrid entities—to optimize tax deferral where desired.

Our attorneys have considerable experience in helping to reduce the overall international tax burdens of our clients. By providing long-range business tax planning, analyzing the tax aspects of international transactions, including international mergers, acquisitions and joint ventures, and creating central cost-sharing agreements for nontechnical functions, we help solve our clients’ complex global tax issues.

The global compensation professionals at Manatt also advise multinational companies on the tax and regulatory implications for a full range of compensation arrangements for domestic and foreign employees. Our attorneys work closely with multinational clients to help structure their compensation programs to maximize the value delivered to their employees while minimizing the risks of noncompliance.

Diversity at Manatt

Manatt considers diversity to be a fundamental component of our institutional identity. As a law firm, we have a professional responsibility, and as individuals, we have a personal responsibility to our respective communities. Incorporating diversity into our culture allows us to enhance the high-quality, creativity and excellence in legal services that our clients have come to expect.

Manatt has invested a significant amount of human and financial resources in our own diversity program. Our philosophy is simple: include women and minority lawyers at all levels of Firm leadership and promote diversity in the legal profession through our support and active involvement in various minority civic and bar organizations.

The mix of our minority and women attorneys has consistently exceeded the national average among the country's top law firms. Our talented mix includes minority and women lawyers serving as heads of offices, members of the firm's Board of Directors and management team, and chairs of some of the firm's most important practice groups.

Inclusive Culture
Our progressive culture allows us to maintain a growing mix of women and minority lawyers, and the results illustrate this commitment.  The American Lawyer ranked our Firm 29th (in the top 12%) on its Diversity Scorecard for the largest 250 law firms in the country for 2009.  Multi Cultural Law Magazine included our Firm on its 2008 lists of the Top 100 Law Firms for Diversity, Top 25 Law Firms for Asian Americans/Pacific Islanders, and Top 25 Law Firms for Openly Gay/Lesbian Americans.

Despite our progress and diversity success, we can do better.  Our challenge extends far beyond exceeding national averages.  Our plan cannot succeed if we focus only on recruiting minority and women attorneys.  The true challenge and measure for achieving success lies in creating and preserving an inclusive environment where our minority and women lawyers will stay, progress, prosper and succeed.  We have implemented a formal diversity program designed to enhance our recruiting and retention of diverse attorneys through an executive mentoring program intended to cultivate personally and professionally meaningful relationships between our diverse lawyers and our partners. 

Our commitment to diversity exists in a living document – a plan – that is concrete, easy to understand and publicly available.  The plan demonstrates to every law school student, lateral associate candidate, lateral partner candidate, recruiter, existing client, and potential client that we are serious about creating a workplace that mirrors the breadth of the communities where we and our clients live and work.

We focus on the following key areas to accomplish our mission.

Targeted Recruitment Effort
At Manatt, recruiting women and minority attorneys does not end on law school campuses. Our recruiting efforts focus on locating talented women and minority lawyers at all levels. At law schools, we seek out and interview students who share our core values in ways shaped and enhanced by their own experience. Manatt's 2005 Summer Program was the most diverse in the Firm's history. Our nine 2005 Summer Associates included two African-American students, three Hispanic students, one Asian-American student and three Caucasian students. Five of these nine students were women.

Mentoring as a Cornerstone
Minority attorneys who join Manatt as new or lateral hires immediately become the focus of a mentoring program. They are paired with senior attorneys who take an active role in encouraging their career development. Mentors actively work with their protégés, helping them form business plans and involving them in firm-wide marketing and development opportunities. Management holds mentors accountable for their roles and their protégés' progress at the Firm, including reviewing their efforts as part of the evaluation and compensation process.

Access to Opportunity
Success is a matter of talent and opportunity. At Manatt, we believe that the key to retaining talented minority attorneys -- and therefore the key to the success of our diversity efforts -- is providing a distinctive experience that offers clear access to professional accomplishment. We provide women and minority attorneys with important responsibilities and leadership opportunities in client development activities, complex litigation, large transactional matters and high-profile community and civic organizations. We also encourage and support minority and women attorneys who take leadership positions within the firm and outside in the community at large.

Long-Term Commitment
We challenge ourselves to make our young lawyers feel valued, involved and invested in the future of the firm. We know that they will eventually occupy the most important financial, management and executive positions at Manatt. Our professionals thrive in an atmosphere that encourages and supports responsibility, ambition, and entrepreneurship. We offer true opportunity equal to individual commitment to success and advancement. That's the history of opportunity at Manatt, where professionals with talent and drive are rewarded with a nurturing, dynamic and energizing climate.

Promoting Diversity
Promoting diversity in the legal profession requires both an investment of money and time. Our women and minority attorneys are prominently involved and hold leadership positions in some of the most important minority civic and bar organizations in the country including:

• Asian Americans of Equality
• Asian Pacific American Legal Center
• Black Entertainment and Sports Lawyers Association
• California Association of Black Lawyers
• California Black Chamber of Commerce
• California Women's Law Center
• Chilean Association of Attorneys
• D.C. Commission on Asian & Pacific Islander Affairs
• Hispanic National Bar Association
• Inner City Law Center
• International Human Rights Committee of the Association of the Bar of City of New York
• Korean American Bar Association
• Korean American Coalition
• L.A. Conservation Corps
• La Raza Galeria Posada
• Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles
• Los Angeles Urban League
• National Asian Pacific American Bar Association
• NOW Legal Defense & Education Fund Board
• Southern California Chinese Lawyers Association
• The Association of Women in International Trade
• Women Lawyers Association
• Women's Bar Association of District of Columbia
• Women's Forum of Washington D.C.