18 ASIAN LEGAL BUSINESS CHINA • 亚洲法律杂志-中国版 JULY 2024 personnel in overseas offices to provide more tailored services for Chinese companies. “On the one hand, we need local lawyers to provide local legal support. On the other hand, we also need Mainland lawyers as a bridge to coordinate and communicate between clients and local lawyers.” There are certainly some “fortunate exceptions.” According to Li, DeHeng’s Hong Kong office, for example, boasts lawyers with Mainland background who are practicing in Hong Kong, and these lawyers can provide legal support and facilitate communication at the same time. Tahota’s Cheng feels deeply about this too. “We value those of Chinese descent who practice locally after studying abroad. They have a better understanding of China’s national circumstances and culture. We are a Chinabased firm that is expanding to the world and must adhere to the Chinese position. Whether it is our Washington office established in 2015, or the offices in Sydney, Bangkok and Vientiane that were established subsequently, the heads of all our overseas offices are all from the Chinese background.” While having different types of personnel can help maintain “Chinese roots” while improving service efficiency, Cheng admits that this arrangement will also bring challenges. “As lawyers come from different regions and have different culture and work habits, they need to take some time to integrate before a good and efficient work mechanism can be achieved,” he says. OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES The establishment of offices overseas has diversified the cross-border services of Chinese firms and enabled them to have more in-depth participation in major projects. Yang tells ALB that Wang Jing & GH’s overseas offices now focus on serving clients’ new needs for cross-border investment, corporate overseas expansion, civil and commercial litigation, intellectual property and immigration and visa maters. “In 2023, our head office worked with the Bangkok office to provide a full suite of services for a leading electric vehicle manufacturer to invest and build factories in Thailand, assisting that company to smoothly establish presence in the country.” Li, on the other hand, has felt changes in the services provided by overseas offices. “In the past, the overseas offices mainly served Chinese companies’ needs for investing overseas and establishing local joint ventures, and services usually ended after transactions were completed. Now, with local offices, we can continue to serve the local operations of Chinese companies, mainly focusing on the areas of compliance and dispute resolution.” Another type of services that continues to rise is the “return business” from overseas. “Overseas clients sometimes have needs for Chinese law services and such needs will then go back to DeHeng’s various Mainland offices. In other words, overseas offices have changed from simply serving the ‘going global’ needs of domestic clients to now acting more as a two-way bridge,” explains Li. As the offerings and coverage of service continue to expand, Tahota has also felt the challenges faced by overseas offices at the business level, in particular “how to provide clients with comprehensive, one-stop legal services.” “Chinese companies increasingly favor Chinese firms and cross-border lawyers who can provide multi-lingual and cross-jurisdictional services. At times, however, the scope of services provided by newly established overseas offices is very limited. In contrast, when ‘going global’, Chinese companies have needs not only for investment and company establishment, but also for labor, human resources, IP and many others. Therefore, Chinese firms need to simultaneously expand the service coverage of cross-border management teams in their head offices and locally-hired foreign lawyers,” says Cheng. In addition, Chinese firms also face practical challenges in their overseas services. “Time difference is one example. Since overseas offices still mainly serve domestic clients, how to solve time difference and meet clients’ demand for timely response worth further study.” “There are also challenges in terms of different cultural and language backgrounds. For example, some projects require the exchange and review of piles of legal documents. The translation and understanding of the wording used in these documents by reviewers, as well as the differences in technical terms and concepts used in different jurisdictions or even legal systems, are all practical legal issues that often appear and must be handled with care,” says Cheng. HONG KONG’S ROLE In the past two years, Hong Kong has continued to play a key role in the international expansion of Chinese firms by virtue of its common law system and international hub status. Data from the Law Society of Hong Kong website show that as of early July this year, a total of 31 Mainland firms have registered as foreign firms in Hong Kong, and 15 offices of Mainland firms have local practice licenses. Going forward, “localization in Hong Kong remains the direction that Chinese firms value,” says Cheng. Hong Kong regulations stipulate that foreign firms must engage in joint venture operations with a local firm for at least three years before applying for a local license. While seemingly restrictive, this requirement serves a valuable purpose. It offers Chinese firms a crucial MP ROUNDTABLE “The BRI covers more than 60 countries in Eurasia and Africa, involving infrastructure, financing, legal protection, litigation and arbitration and many other practice areas. These countries naturally become new‘must-win’ destinations for Chinese firms.” — Cheng Shoutai, Tahota Law Firm “‘一带一路’沿线涵盖了亚欧大陆和 非洲的60多个国家，涉及基建、融资、 法律保障、诉讼和仲裁等多个业务领 域，自然成为了中国律所新的‘必争 之地’。” — 程守太，泰和泰律师事务所
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