Commercial Disputes

Elaboration of a strategy to protect the Client’s rights to a well-known brand.

Our Client is Denis Nikolayevich Simachev, a well-known modeller, designer and restaurateur.
At the claim of a foreign company, the Client's trademark was cancelled.
Our team developed a strategy to protect the Client's rights to his brand. As a result of its successful implementation, the trademark of a foreign company was cancelled.

Our Client is Denis Nikolayevich Simachev, a well-known modeller, designer and restaurateur.
At the claim of a foreign company, the Client's trademark was cancelled.

Our team developed a strategy to protect the Client's rights to his brand. As a result of its successful implementation, the trademark of a foreign company was cancelled. The cancellation of the legal protection to the trademark will allow the Client to restore the rights to his trademark.

As a result, the Client will be able to conduct further creative and entrepreneurial activities using his brands.

Protecting the client’s interests in a dispute against a foreign supplier and a bank from an unfriendly jurisdiction as a result of non-performance of the contract.

Our Client is a food producer who entered into a supply contract secured by a guarantee with a foreign entity and a foreign bank. The supplier failed to fulfil the contract, and the bank refused to pay the guarantee, citing restrictive measures imposed on Russia.

The foreign supplier and financial institution, when refusing to fulfil their obligations, unreasonably grounded their actions on the European sanctions imposed on Russia.

PB Legal lawyers have elaborated an effective strategy to protect the Client's interests in a dispute with dishonest counterparties, which includes exequatur of a Russian court judgement in foreign jurisdictions.

Our team also:

Works on litigation representation;
Prepares a defense of non-application of sanctions legislation to the contract.

Elaboration of a strategy for the acquisition of a premium hotel chain in the foreign bankruptcy case of a foreign bank.

Our Client is a management company of one of the largest international hotel chains. The client is interested in acquiring a premium hotel chain owned by a insolvent foreign bank. The hotels are subject to ongoing legal disputes in the Russian Federation regarding the bank's pledge rights over them.

The Latvian bank granted a secured loan to a third-party company for the development of hotels in three regions of the Russian Federation. When the bank was declared bankrupt, the bankruptcy trustee discovered that the mortgages had been disbursed and the loan was no longer being repaid. He therefore applied to the court to recover the loan amount, restore the mortgage and foreclose on the pledged property.

In the proceedings in the courts of first and appeal instances, the loan agreement was declared void and the reinstatement of the pledge was refused.

Our Client is a potential buyer of rights of claim who has engaged our team to assess legal risks and ways of cancelling judicial acts in the court of cassation instance. The client is also considering alternative (non-judicial) ways of acquiring assets.

PB legal team analysed the documents, prepared a negotiation strategy and legal opinions on:

the content of the decision of the court
possible ways of challenging the judgement
the judgement of the appeal instance
the prospects of cassation challenge
the legal grounds for cancelling earlier court decisions.

Comprehensive support of land disputes of a major agricultural producer Client.

Our Client is a large agricultural producer. The client is a party to a number of court disputes in relation to land plots: on recognition of title to a land plot; recognition of a lease agreement as valid; termination of a lease agreement.
As part of a complex structured transaction, the Client was to obtain ownership of a land plot.

Our Client is a large agricultural producer. The client is a party to a number of court disputes in relation to land plots: on recognition of title to a land plot; recognition of a lease agreement as valid; termination of a lease agreement.

As part of a complex structured transaction, the Client was to obtain ownership of a land plot. Due to the opponents' activities, the ownership to the land plot was not registered for the Client. At the same time, the opponents filed a claim to seize the land plot from the Client.

We developed a strategy to protect the Client's rights. As part of its implementation, our team achieved (1) nullification of the sale and purchase agreement for this land plot between the opponents and (2) the court's dismissal of the claim to seize the land plot from the Client.

Our team is currently representing the Client in a court proceeding to recognise the ownership of a land plot. The opponents arranged the exclusion of the defendant company from the commercial registry, which was successfully appealed by us. The opponents then arranged a controlled bankruptcy of the defendant company, which our team is currently successfully opposing.

The PB Legal team also developed a strategy of declaring the Client's lease agreement valid in respect of another land plot and obtained a court judgement restoring the Client's lease rights. Our team is currently representing the Client in a dispute over the cancellation of the said lease agreement.

By representing the Client's rights PB Legal creates judicial practice in complex disputes on recognition of rights to land plots, as well as practice on counteracting controlled bankruptcies.

Successful implementation of the project will help the Client to use land plots for agricultural production freely.

Representing the Client in a dispute in arbitration proceedings against a French counterparty.

Our Client is the largest agro-industrial enterprise in the Tver region. The Client previously acted as a customer under a service agreement. The Client refused to fulfil the contract due to loss of interest as the French company (service provider) had improperly fulfilled its obligations.

The counterparty applied to the ICAC at the RF CCI (MKAS) for recovery of the entire cost of the services of the first stage, as well as a penalty for failure to fulfil the obligation to pay. The contractor also believed that the advance payment had not been made for all stages, but only for the first stage.

The PB Legal team, in turn, prepared a counterclaim, in which we demanded the refund of the unearned advance payment.

The ICAC at the RF CCI refused the counterparty in full and satisfied the client's claim.

The PB Legal team then applied to the Moscow Arbitrazh Court to obtain a writ of execution to enforce the decision of the ICAC panel. The court confirmed the client's position that state courts are limited in their powers to review the legality of interpretation and application of Russian legislation and granted the request for the writ of execution.

Revocation of interim measures imposed by a Cypriot court on the Client’s property during a corporate conflict.

Our Client is a shareholder of a German construction company where a corporate conflict between the shareholders occurred during the completion of a major project. A Cypriot court imposed interim measures prohibiting the Client from disposing of his assets.

As part of cooperation with the Client, PB Legal provides legal support for the dispute with drafting of legal position and procedural documents, as well as coordinates the work of foreign (German and Cypriot) counsels for participation in court proceedings abroad. PB Legal also develops a legal strategy and strengthens the Client's procedural defence.

A positive outcome of this dispute will allow the Client to improve the financial performance of the joint venture, as the Client's assets abroad of RUB 500,000,000 are currently placed under interim measures.