Full Service Law Firm in Portugal, Angola, and Spain

FCB&A

Calle Fray Juan Gil, 5 bajo
Madrid 28002
Spain

 +34 91 7819570
 +34 91 5762692

www.fcblegal.com/en/
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Law Firm Overview

FCB&A is a leading independent law firm in both Portugal and Angola. It also has associated offices in Brazil and Macau.

FCB&A, founded in 1989, was the first Portuguese law firm to establish an EEIG in 1992 together with other leading firms in the UK, Spain and Brazil. This gave the firm, its partners and its lawyers, unique international experience when it chose to become independent several years later. The firm’s philosophy is “innovation through experience”. This is its way of developing its projects, making use of the firm’s experience. The firm has combined and will develop and build on, its professional careers to improve its practice, compete among the best, commit itself to excellence in all endeavors and serve the firm’s clients.

Clients know the firm well, even when it restructures its activities to face the ever increasing challenges of the 21st century. To be good does not mean being the oldest, the most established or the biggest; it requires a continued effort and improvement of the firm’s professionals and staff, and a commitment to continue to provide the best quality legal service. FCB&A has sought to combine the traditional values of the legal profession with the provision of innovative and creative, but experienced services.

The firm’s partners and associates all have a large international experience, insofar as the majority of clients are international companies or groups and their local subsidiaries. The firm encourages participation in international conferences, seminars and other professional meetings. Its view is that such participation cannot be restricted to a handful of partners and it is enthusiastic that associates also work as ambassadors of the firm. FCB&A is open to increasing its professional contacts and connections throughout the world, namely in the European Union, particularly where it already has existing strong contacts – in the United Kingdom and Spain, as well as in Brazil, the United States of America and the former Portuguese colonies.

Practice Areas

Practice Areas Description

Our practice areas include a wide range of legal services, which include, among others, the following:

- Corporate, Commercial and M&A

FCB&A is able to provide a myriad of legal services in the corporate, commercial and M&A areas at both national and international levels. The areas in which we have most experience are:

• Incorporation of companies
• Mergers;
• Acquisitions;
• Demergers;
• Conversions;
• Share transfers, transfer of businesses as a going concern and assets transfers.

- Public, Administrative and Environmental law

We have an extensive experience in administrative law and, in general, public law, providing our clients with assistance, namely, in all types of dealings with official Portuguese public entities, such as:

• public works;
• supply contracts;
• construction;
• expropriations; and
• environmental matters;

- Real Estate, Property and Construction

We have a large experience in all matters regarding investments, construction and real estate development and our partners and associates provide a full spread of services including:

• Assistance to real estate and management companies in all areas of their business.
• Advise on property development and funding.
• Advise on the acquisition and sale of commercial and residential properties.
• Assistance in the taking and granting of leases.
• Assistance in the issue of all necessary licenses and permits during the construction phases.

- Dispute Resolution

Our firm has a specialized litigation group, which advises and assists cases in all areas of law covered by our firm, both before national and international courts, as well as arbitration tribunals.

Our most relevant expertise and experience include:

• Assistance in civil and commercial court litigation, including, among others, torts, contracts, credit recovery, landlord and tenant, family, inheritance, commercial, bankruptcy and company recovery, from first instance jurisdiction through to Supreme Court appeals.
• Criminal litigation.
• Tax and public (administrative) disputes, both hierarchical appeals and judicial review.
• Employment disputes.
• National and international arbitration proceedings, from its preparation, to its conduct and enforcement.
• Enforcement of foreign judgments.
• For cases decided abroad, we have served proceedings (writs, summons and sentences), assisted in the discovery process and prepared affidavits.

- Employment, Benefits and Pensions

Conscious of the need to promote an accurate and effective management of employment relations between employers and employees in order to optimize human resources and ensure the levels of high competition of companies FCB&A has the required expertise and experience to make possible the provision of a full range of services, namely, in the following matters:

• Advice on general and strategic employment and social security issues.
• Legal support on companies' restructuring processes, including collective dismissals and individual redundancies, termination by mutual consent and lay-off.
• Review and drafting of individual employment contracts, temporary employment contracts, employee's assignment contracts and services contracts.
• Management of employment contracts (including functional and geographical mobility, change of remuneration, fringe benefits and preparation of bonus incentive plans and stock option purchase plans).
• Tax and social security issues, from registration to management and disputes.
• Labour due diligence.
• Defense in court proceedings, arbitration committees and administrative entities involving employment related claims and suits filed by employees, Unions and Portuguese Labour Authority.
• Assistance in meetings with Unions, Class Associations and Regional Labour Offices.
• Accidents at the workplace and employer's obligations in relation to Health and Safety at the workplace.
• Assistance on hiring of foreign employees and legalization processes.

- Tax

The complexity of national and international taxation rules determines an increasing need for expert tax advice, which assumes a crucial role in the modern market, as it evolves into more complex transactions. Our experience dictates that every business transaction always has direct or indirect tax consequences, which require an efficient tax planning, identification of the most tax efficient structures in order to avoid future unnecessary liabilities.

To maximize the efficiency of our client's current taxation and bearing in mind their global aims, FCB&A provides strategic advice at every stage of transactions, on all aspects of domestic and international tax, in co-ordination with our other practice areas, providing a tax-related advice as part of an integrated service, as well as direct advice to the clients. We advise on a broad range of tax issues, including:

• M&A tax planning;
• international group structuring;
• capital markets and banking taxes;
• investment funds;
• securitizations;
• transfer pricing;
• VAT and other indirect taxes;
• employment tax;
• property tax;
• disputes; and
• Litigation.

- Banking and Capital Markets

Our firm has advised various banking and financial operations, through its vast experience in corporate finance and financial services (including privatizations and global offerings).

FCB&A also acts for many companies in their relationship with banks and international financial institutions as well as credit institutions and financial companies. In the past years, FCB&A has invested in the area of project finance, which has been increasingly developing in Portugal.

- Intellectual Property

Our firm advises on industrial and intellectual property matters, including:

• Trademarks, patents, industrial designs and models, logos, trade and corporate names; and
• Copyright, know-how, protection of confidential information and protection of software.

Our practice comprises several aspects in the area of intellectual property, including the following:

• Provision of active assistance in the identification of the client's intellectual property rights and in the support to the decision aimed at electing their protection strategy, according to the available options;
• Preparation of draft contractual documents related to intellectual property rights, including those aimed at transferring, licensing or encumbering them;
• Handling of the administrative registration procedures (national, within the EC and international) since the filling of the registration application and its subsequent terms, presenting any requests, claims, oppositions and replies that may be necessary, until a final decision is issued by the competent authorities, including any renewal and extension requests;
• Legal support in operations that involve the transfer of intellectual property rights, as well as conduction of due diligences, within corporate mergers and acquisitions and for purposes of supporting financing operations having as guarantees the intellectual property rights;
• Legal assistance in litigation related to infringement of any industrial property rights, including appeals from the PIIP's and OHIM's decisions and court proceedings regarding trademark, design or patent infringement and/or counterfeiting, unfair competition and/or misleading advertising, as well as infringement of copyright, know-how, confidential information and software.

Affiliations

More Information on FCB&A

Madrid, Spain Corporate Lawyers
Public Law Firm in Madrid, Spain
Madrid, Spain Real Estate Lawyers
Madrid, Spain Dispute Resolution Lawyer
Employment Law Firm, Madrid, Spain
Madrid, Spain Tax Lawyers
Banking Law Firm in Madrid, Spain
Madrid, Spain Intellectual Property Lawyer
FCB&A News and Publications
FCB&A Recruitment
Contact FCB&A

Other Offices

• Angola - Luanda
• Portugal - Faro
• Portugal - Lisbon - Main Office
• Portugal - Oporto