COVID-19: health and safety protocol - Last night the Italian Government and National representatives of employers’ associations and unions have reached an agreement over a COVID-19 health & safety protocol that employers need to implement to ensure the maximum possible protection of their employees against the COVID-19 virus. This protocol is a crucial step to allow business continuity for manufacturing companies and professional service providers ...
Many organizations may be parties to contracts where the counterparty is seeking to cancel its obligations because of COVID-19. This situation is arising in relation to various commercial relationships, including supply agreements, events planning contracts, and numerous other types of agreements ...
During the press conference of 13 March 2020, Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager made a statement regarding the enforcement of EU State aid in connection with measures adopted by Member States to combat the negative repercussions of COVID-19 on the economy ...
We regularly work with financial institutions to navigate the challenges of implementing, maintaining, and using security procedures for commercial customers’ use of treasury management services. Security procedures are an integral part of the relationship between the financial institution and its commercial customers ...
The State Taxation Administration (STA) released several announcements in the beginning of February which established preferential tax policies for facilitating the prevention and control of the outbreak of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) and supporting enterprises to resume their business operations. Certain preferential tax treatments are specifically offered to enterprises and individuals that are directly involved in the prevention and control of the outbreak of COVID-19 ...
This is a question being asked by many companies. Is the severity of this event such that it enables companies to temporarily (or permanently) be excused from performance of their contractual obligations? As is often the case with legal questions, it depends. The term “force majeure” does not have a recognised meaning under English law ...
Introduction The supply chain effects from the global spread of the novel coronavirus have been building for nearly two months, and are expected to reach a peak in the near future (if not necessarily then to recede).[1] The effects have centered on China to date, but the epidemic has spread to other centers of production and the duration of its threat to public health and of the governmental and social measures taken to address its spread remains unknown ...
The outbreak of COVID-19 comes on the back of an already tumultuous two years for the global economy, markets and trade where the US-China "trade war" and other trade tensions and macroeconomic factors have created uncertainty, commercial losses and subdued growth prospects ...
The extent of disruption caused by COVID-19 is unknowable at this time. However, it is likely that there will be suppliers unable to economically weather the storm. Having represented manufacturing customers and suppliers for decades, one thing is certain: even the most sophisticated entities make costly mistakes in addressing distressed suppliers without realizing they paid more as a customer than was necessary ...
The UK Government believes that up to a fifth of the workforce may be off sick during the peak of a Coronavirus epidemic. It remains to be seen whether Coronavirus will affect that volume of people, but there are already clear signs of how it is disrupting the day-to-day operations of businesses in the UK and around the rest of the world ...
With the economy facing downward pressure, the Hong Kong Government is rolling out various supporting and funding measures to help enterprises. The $30 billion HK$ Anti-epidemic Fund The Legislative Council Finance Committee approved the $30 billion Anti-epidemic Fund on 21 February 2020, more than half of which - HK$16.9 billion - will serve as one-off cash injections to retailers, food and beverages service providers, start-ups and other businesses ...
On February 13th, 2020 was published in the Official Gazette the “Regulation of the Do Not Disturb or Antispam system”, with the purpose of regulating its existence and functionality. This Regulation seeks to clearly stablish consumer’s and supplier’s rights and duties, as well as the proceedings associated with the Do Not Disturb System, the website tool provided by the National Consumer Service (SERNAC) ...
They’ve finally taken the plunge and decided to go it alone, they’re just about to launch the brilliant business plan that’s going to set them up for life and then, out of the blue, granny puts her oar in and everything goes pear-shaped. Just a month ago, we wrote about how Harry and Meghan were set to launch their Sussex Royal brand ...
In our geography in constant transition, resources must be shielded, which is why we must revisit as investors the macro trends as economists call it, prudence in investment matters is imposed without restraining dynamism, only taking it in a gradual and diversified way. Investing in companies or funds with a green seal is one of the strategies that have been outlined for this new year 2020 ...
New anti-harassment law in time for new virus panic. The COVID-19 crisis that began in Wuhan, China, brings to mind earlier epidemics. In 2003, we were in the grip of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars). It was the first pandemic in the era of the Internet, blogging and social media. Amid the panic about infections, one individual was widely labelled a “super spreader”. Her name and personal details were published ...
The outbreak of the coronavirus and the measures taken by the Chinese government to contain it have brought production in China as the world's workbench to a complete standstill. Companies that operate in China or purchase such goods are currently facing delivery shortfalls. A similar situation could soon threaten Italy, where the first factory closures have already taken place ...
In response to the impact of COVID-19 and the partial withdrawal of EBA benefits – see our update here – the Cambodian government have issued a number of regulations which are intended to provide some relief to affected businesses in Cambodia. We outline these updates below: Letter 1313 MEF – dated 25 February 2020 Notification no ...
BVI government welcomes announcement. Blacklist expands to include 12 jurisdictions.On 18 February 2020, EU Finance Ministers updated the EU list of non-cooperative tax jurisdictions, upgrading the British Virgin Islands to whitelist status, which designates the country as a fully co-operative tax jurisdiction in line with all of the tax good-governance standards ...
Several recent reports claim that the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic in China is beginning to slow down and generally under control, prompting businesses in China to resume operations. In order to minimise further spreading of the virus as employees return to work, the PRC government has issued different local rules and guidelines to ensure enterprises are adequately prepared ...
Today, artificial intelligence (AI) based on neural networks may come up with ideas that are not dependent on human input. This raises questions as to who shall be regarded as the inventor of an invention created solely by a machine. Could an AI system be considered the inventor behind a patented invention? The answer is no, concludes EPO – the European Patent Office - in two recent applications ...
Summary On January 13, 2020, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) issued final regulations to implement the Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act of 2018 (FIRRMA)1 (the “Regulations”2). The Regulations go into effect on February 13, 2020. CFIUS’s existing regulations (the “Pilot Program”) will continue to apply to transactions that close prior to February 13, 2020 ...
There had been several drafts of the law on Personal Data Protection until the final draft that was submitted by the Indonesian Government to the House of Representatives on 24 January 2020 (“Final Draft Law”). When passed, it will be Indonesia’s first framework legislation to specifically deal with and serve as the ‘umbrella regulation’ on personal data protection ...
On 30 January 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared that the outbreak of novel coronavirus or COVID-19 constituted a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC). The COVID-19 is a respiratory illness caused by a new coronavirus which first originated in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China, the death toll from which has reportedly surpassed 1,000 on mainland China, while confirmed infections have passed 40,000 globally ...
Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the world of Intellectual Property has raised some very interesting questions and debate. The patentability of AI related inventions, proprietary issues of inventorship and the lack of adequate regulations and standards have left some open-ended questions. AI related inventions generally use techniques like machine learning, deep learning and neural networks ...
