PRESS RELEASE

Biri ş Goran Strengthens its Financial Restructuring and Insolvency Practice

Bucharest, 15 April 2010

Ana Birchall has joined the Biri ş Goran Law firm as Head of Financial Restructuring and Insolvency Group. Ana is a Romanian qualified lawyer, with more than 12 years of experience including in the USA in banking, finance, commercial and international law. Her main focus has been on financial restructuring and insolvency, cross-border insolvency proceedings, bank distressed assets, regulatory as well as bankruptcies of financial institutions.

Prior to joining Biri ş Goran Ana worked with White & Case's Bucharest office, and with White & Case LLP, New York , where she was involved in major transactions such as ENRON, MCI-Worldcom, United Airlines, US AI R, UPC, Ahold and RBS.

Since her return to in 2003, she has held various senior advisory positions in the Romanian Government, dealing with the initiating, negotiating and rolling-out of the process regarding the alignment of Romania's legislative system to the EU acquis communautaire. During the process, Ana had a lead role in initiating and/or amending legislation referring to various practice areas including bankruptcy, insolvency, commercial legislation.

Ana graduated from the Nicolae Titulescu University, Faculty of Law and International Affairs, obtained a law degree from Faculty of Law, University of Bucharest, and she received a magna cum laude LL.M. and PhD. in Law form the Yale Law School, Yale University (USA).

Regarded as one of the top bankruptcy specialists both in Romania and internationally, Ana undertook a major research in insolvency and bankruptcy under the supervision of Dean Anthony Kronman of Yale Law School, USA. Her thesis, "Banking Insolvency in Post-Socialist Economies: Romania, , and compared to USA, UK, , ", represents the first complex study analyzing the bankruptcy systems in the banking sector of several Eastern European jurisdictions and is considered a landmark study for the transition economies.

Ana is teaching the first insolvency procedure course and is the head of the research group for insolvency, bankruptcy law and financial reorganization at the "Dimitrie Cantemir" Law Faculty, Bucharest.

About Biri ş Goran Since being established in 2006, Biri ş Goran has grown to over 30 attorneys and fiscal consultants, with its separate fiscal consulting practice whose partner Ruxandra Jianu is licensed with the Romanian Chamber of Fiscal Consultants, and its insolvency practitioners group, registered with the National Union of Insolvency Practitioners in Romania (UNPIR).

Biri ş Goran also has five partners and attorneys who are licensed to practice in the United States (New York, Florida) and Canada (Quebec).