ParadigmINTERNATIONAL SOCIETY OF PRIMERUS LAW FIRMS WINTER 2013 Assuring You We’re the World’s Finest A Quality Lawyer is Hard to Find: Primerus is Here to Help Current Legal Topics: North America • Europe, Middle East & Africa Latin America & Caribbean • Asia Pacific The Primerus Paradigm – Winter 2013 President’s Podium – Every lawyer in Primerus shares Assuring You We’re the a commitment to a set of common values World’s Finest known as the Six Pillars: Integrity page 4 Excellent Work Product Reasonable Fees Continuing Legal Education Civility Community Service For a full description of these values, please visit www.primerus.com. A Quality Lawyer is Hard to Find: Primerus is Here to Help page 5 PaINTERNATIONAL SOCIETY raOF PRIMERUS LAW FIRMSdigmWINTER 2013 Assuring You We’re the World’s Finest A Quality Lawyer is Hard to Find: Primerus is Here to Help Current Legal Topics: North America • Europe, Middle East & Africa Latin America & Caribbean • Asia Pacifi c Primerus Member Firm Directories – North America, page 30 Europe, Middle East & Africa, page 50 About our cover Latin America & Caribbean, page 58 Primerus and all of its attorneys are under the page 64 magnifying glass to ensure they’re providing Asia Pacific, nothing but the highest quality service and most reasonable fees – all the time, everywhere Primerus Member Firm Locations around the world. Thanks to our ongoing quality assurance efforts, Primerus can say with page 65 confidence, we are the world’s finest. Scan this with your smartphone Primerus Community Service – to learn more about Primerus. 2012 Winner and Finalists Collins & Lacy Kubasiak, Fylstra, Thorpe & Rotunno and Lewis Johs Avallone Aviles page 66 Publisher & Editor in Chief: John C. Buchanan Managing Editor: Chad Sluss © 2013 International Society of Primerus Law Firms 2 THE PRIMERUS PARADIGM The Primerus Paradigm – Winter 2013 North America, pages 8-41 Europe, Middle East & Africa, pages 42-51 Legal Traps for Unwary College Students Social Media: and their Parents What Corporate Counsel Must Know Jim Rudolph, page 8 Reinier W.L. Russell & Michele Stutz, page 42 New York’s Expedited Procedure for Collecting on The German Green Card Is Blue a Note or Default Judgment Thomas Schwab, page 46 Harry Beatty & Joshua Katz, page 10 Strategic Considerations Relating to Effective Enforcement The Finnish Regulatory Framework for Foreign Insurers in the United States of Commercial Money Judgments Tiina Ashorn, page 48 Imposed by Courts in Other Countries Stephen D. R. Taylor, page 12 Limiting Your Exposure to Winter – Latin America & Caribbean, pages 52-59 Avoid the Liabilities Inherent with Snow and Ice The Brazilian Civil Code and The Bona Fides Principle Todd Zimmerman, page 14 Eduardo Montenegro Serur, page 52 Crowdfunding: What You Need to Know Melissa Demorest, page 16 The History of Franchising in Panama Ileana Cespedes, page 54 The Rising Tide of Obesity: Managing Your Risk as an Employer The Supreme Courts of Justice in Mexico and the United Sarah Scott, page 18 States Mario Melgar-Adalid, page 56 A Business’ Obligations Under the Identity Theft Protection Act Asia Pacific, pages 60-64 Richard Simon, page 20 Hiring and Firing Local and Foreign Employees in China Caroline Berube & Deborah Loedt, page 60 Oppression of Shareholders, Good Faith and the Duty of Loyalty Richard Rosen & Tim Muller, page 22 Repatriating Dividends from China-based Investments Edward Sun, page 62 Agricultural Contract Clauses for Supplying Energy Crops to the Biofuels Industry William Mason & Brittany Brent Smith, page 24 An Offer You Can’t Refuse? DOs and DON’Ts of Selling or Buying a Business Michael Henry, page 27 WINTER 2013 3 President’s Podium John C. Buchanan Assuring You We’re the World’s Finest As I write to you, we are closing the want to talk with you about just one of world. Not only are we out working for books on 2012, a very successful year for those safeguards: our newly established you by searching for the best law firms Primerus, and looking ahead to 2013, a Quality Assurance Board. The board in the world, we vet them using a strict year which promises even more growth has the important role of further admission procedure, and then audit for us within the United States and defining the high standards embodied them annually (more often if needed) to around the world. With 200 law firms in the Six Pillars and translating them ensure they’re still meeting the highest in 44 countries, we are larger now than across cultures around the world. The quality standards. ever before. I expect early in 2013, we Six Pillars (Integrity, Excellent Work I’m proud of the systems Primerus will be in 50 countries. Primerus truly is Product, Reasonable Fees, Continuing has in place to ensure that every If one of our member firms has a client needing the resources of another member firm, they simply pick up the phone and call. Because we have so stringently screened and monitored our member firms, they can have complete confidence in the quality of fellow member firms. revolutionizing the law firm of the future, Legal Education, Civility and Community interaction you have with one of our offering very high quality legal services Service) form the bedrock of Primerus. law firms is a positive one. When we at reasonable fees around the world. Any Primerus law firm has a longstanding say we have the world’s finest law firms, But as many of you know from record of commitment to these values, we mean it. But perhaps it means even experience, with growth comes new and now we’re doing the important work more to hear our clients talk about their challenges. How do we ensure that of making sure they mean the same thing experiences with us. Starting on page every lawyer in every one of our law to every member around the world. 5, you’ll hear from just a few of many firms around the world is meeting the The Quality Assurance Board, clients who say Primerus is the first quality and ethical standards that form working together with our well place they come when they’re looking the foundation of Primerus? After just established Accreditation Board, will for a good lawyer, because they know returning from our first Primerus Global review the performance of all member that the next Primerus firm they hire is Conference in Scottsdale, Arizona, I firms, facilitate client matter referrals certain to be as good as the last one they can assure you our quality standards and identify best practice standards. As worked with. stand strong, and we are indeed the one part of their duties, expect to see If you haven’t yet discovered exactly world’s finest law firms. I know this is a after-matter client surveys when you who the world’s finest law firms are, I bold claim. And as an attorney myself, I work with a Primerus firm. I’m a firm invite you to do so in 2013. I know it know you cannot make a claim like that believer in the J.D. Power and Associates will be worth it. without the evidence to prove it. approach to customer (or client, if you You’ll read more on page 5 about will) satisfaction. This board, working the systems we have in place to ensure as one piece of our larger approach to quality throughout our ranks, but I quality assurance, will help us use the proven J.D. Power system in the legal 4 THE PRIMERUS PARADIGM A Quality Lawyer is Hard to Find: Primerus is Here to Help A recent study revealed how difficult it Dependable Quality and conducting ongoing quality reviews is for corporate counsel to find a good of member firms. “The selection of Time and time again, clients report that international law firm – and how often competent and trusted counsel is the Primerus is the first place they look for they’ve ultimately regretted their choice. most important task, and Primerus has a quality, reasonably priced law firm, The study found 45 percent of already done that in many international whether for work in the United States North and Latin American companies locations,” he said. “But expanding and or abroad. fired the international law firms they deepening the mutual understanding Matthew Morrison, Vice President of hired, most often due to poor service of our individual business and cultural Claims Legal for QBE North America, and communication problems. The customs is another essential way that all said many Primerus firms are on his study, “The Selection and Retention of Primerus attorneys ensure their clients company’s panel of approved counsel, International Law Firms,” conducted will continue to be well served.” and he calls on them routinely for by LexisNexis and Martindale-Hubbell, According to Buchanan, the Quality litigation needs throughout the United asked 157 in-house counsel in Canada, Assurance Board is just one aspect of States. Consistent quality from one the U.S. and Latin America about their Primerus’ larger coordinated effort to Primerus firm to another gives him the hiring of foreign law firms (meaning those make sure that every one of its lawyers is confidence he needs to hire them. operating outside their domestic market). the “world’s finest.” “If a firm is a member of Primerus, “This statistic is very unfortunate “Everything Primerus does comes we can make the analogy that it must and shows exactly why Primerus is the together in the big picture,” Buchanan be just as good as the Primerus firm we answer for corporate counsel around the said. “And that big picture is to bring just worked with in Texas, or anywhere world,” said Primerus President and the world’s finest law firms together with else,” Morrison said.