Asters Opens the Brussels Office
October, 2018 - Kyiv, Ukraine
Following the largest merger ever between two leading Ukrainian law firms, Asters is pleased to announce the launch of its representative office in Brussels in November 2018. This launch and a recently established Washington DC office is an organic addition for the 150-lawyer strong Ukrainian firm and is in line with Asters stated strategy of establishing a presence in the most important foreign jurisdictions for the Ukrainian market.
Asters presence at the heart of EU will enable lawyers from multiple practices to closely monitor developments in European law and policy and offer Ukrainian clients a timely outlook on the issues likely to affect them — whether now or soon.
"Ukraine is set to accede to EU and a large number of EU rules are already being implemented into domestic legislation and enforcement practice. Moreover, the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement provides for direct application of certain EU legislation and case law, for example, in the State Aid domain", comments Oleksiy Didkovskiy, firm's Co-Managing Partner.
The office will provide a convenient interface for the firm's friends and clients in Brussels and throughout the EU. This will help further optimize and streamline work done in Ukraine but coordinated from Brussels, such as multi-jurisdictional merger filings and trade issues. The office will not advise on EU law but focus on further development of the longstanding relationships with international law firms to better serve Asters clients. It will also act as a liaison to EU institutions and Brussels-based NGOs.
Brussels office will be run by Marta Barandiy, Of Counsel, who has been based in Brussels for more than 10 years and chaired Promote Ukraine, the leading non-governmental organization for development of Ukraine-EU cooperation. Marta holds a Ph.D in law and is a visiting lecturer at the Ukrainian Free University Munich.
Alexey Pustovit (Partner, Competition & International Trade), Sergiy Glushchenko (Counsel, Compliance), and Igor Kotsiuba (Of Counsel, TMT & Cybersecurity) will share their time between Kyiv and Brussels.
Asters is the first Ukrainian law firm to open an office in Brussels.
