Martin Šolc, partner of Kocián Šolc Balaštík (KSB), has been elected Lawyer of the Year 2007, Commercial Law. His success means that KSB has won the award in three consecutive years - Jiří Balaštík was Lawyer of the Year 2005 (Property) and Professor Dědič was Lawyer of the Year 2006 (Commercial).

Kocián Šolc Balaštík (KSB) provided PPF Group N.V. with legal services in Czech and EU law in regard to establishment of European Company HC SE. The procedure involved merger of Home Credit Grand Holding a.s. and HC Holding a.s. into Dutch entity HCES N.V. which changed its legal form into HC SE as a result of the merger. The transaction included resolution of employee involvement issues in the merging companies and subsidiaries in the Czech Republic, Netherlands and Slovakia.

Law firm Kocián Šolc Balaštík has been appointed by Hochtief CZ, a.s. as legal advisor for its consortium in connection with preparation of the Public Private Partnership (PPP) project titled “Project for Central Military Hospital’s Staff Dormitory, Hotel and Parking Place”. The project consists of financing, building and operation of Prague Central Military Hospital’s staff dormitory, hotel, parking place and related structures. The investment value of the project amounts to CZK 1 billion.

Law firm Kocián Šolc Balaštík (KSB) extended its team in early January by attorney Jan Najman, whose practice is focused on the law of commercial companies, mergers and acquisitions and the law of commercial obligations.

Kocián Šolc Balaštík acted for RWE Transgas before the Brno Regional Office against the Chairman of the Office for the Protection of Economic Competition on an appeal against a ruling on abuse of dominant position.

VGP’s share issue today is the second IPO on the Prague Stock Exchange this year offered by VGP, an industrial developer specialising in construction and lease of sites for logistics and light manufacture. Kocián Šolc Balaštík has advised VGP almost right from the start of its business activities in the Czech Republic on many matters including contract leases, land acquisitions as well as corporate and employment law.

Pavel Dejl, Pavel Nosek and Ivo Šimeček have recently contributed a chapter on the Czech Republic for publication in Leniency Regimes (pub. European Lawyer Limited) reflecting changes applied as from 28 June 2007 by the Czech Office for the Protection of Economic Competition and based on the ECN Model Leniency Program and the existing European Commission Leniency Program. Under the new regime, the Office may use its discretion to reduce fines imposed on parties to secret horizontal cartel agreements if they work together with the Office to detect and disclose such arrangements. The contribution is a full update on the position under the former Leniency Program dating from 2001. Download the chapter here

Law firm Kocián Šolc Balaštík represented the Austrian company New Frontier Holding GmbH in purchase of sixty percent share in the Czech company Profinit, s.r.o., a provider of specialized IT solutions.

Law firm Kocián Šolc Balaštík assisted OKD in a further step toward its restructuring, consisting of spinning off part of OKD’s assets into a newly established company, as part of KSB’s continuing provision of consultancy to OKD and the RPG Group, to which OKD belongs. The spin-off took effect on 31 October 2007.

Law firm Kocián Šolc Balaštík organises the traditional Charity Concert for the Good Will Committee – Olga Havlová Foundation. This year is the concert’s thirteenth year, taking place on Sunday 25 November 2007, 7:00 p.m., at the concert hall of the Church of St. Simon and Jude in Prague Old Town.

Aleš Váňa is the latest member to join the team of attorneys at KSB’s Karlovy Vary branch. He joined the firm in November and is a specialist in civil and commercial law, litigation and real estate law. Aleš Váňa graduated from the Law Faculty of Charles University in Prague in 2003 and subsequently obtained experience and knowledge in advising regional entrepreneurial entities, first as a junior lawyer and then as an attorney in 2007.

Kocián Šolc Balaštík advised Gordon Ramsay in connection with the opening of a new MAZE restaurant at the Hilton Prague Old Town (formerly Renaissance Hotel Prague). KSB's advice covered corporate and commercial, real property and labour law matters.

Kocián Šolc Balaštík (KSB) fought off most of the mixed volleyball competition at Nymburk (5-7 October 2007) at the 10th Bar Games to come second.

Kocián Šolc Balaštík acted for participants in KSK BONO and Bono Servis on the sale of their 100% interests to MISPOL S.A., a Polish company listed on the Warsaw stock exchange and a market leader in the manufacture and distribution of canned meat, spreads, ready meals and animal feeds. The value of the transaction, also involving interests in other members of KSK BONO Holding in Poland and Slovakia, was 10 million EUR.

Kocián Šolc Balaštík advised <a href="http://www.sabic.com/" title="Saudi Basic Industries Corporation" >Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC) on the Czech involvement in the world-wide acquisition of the plastics division from General Electric. The acquisition was completed on 31&nbsp;August 2007. The deal is worth more than 11 billion USD.

Kocián Šolc Balaštík (KŠB) law office represented Brau Union AG, a member of the multinational Heineken Brewery Group, before the Czech Anti-trust Office on an application for approval of the acquisition of Královský pivovar Krušovice. KŠB's wide-ranging services were instrumental in securing unconditional approval for the merger, granted by the Office on 3&nbsp;August 2007. With the acquisition of Krušovice brewery, the Heineken Group has a major player on the market for beer production and distribution in the Czech Republic.

Václav Rovenský and Tomáš Sequens prepared the article on legal regulations and rules for the Czech gas market business. The contribution is part of the publication Getting the Deal Through – Gas Regulation 2007, issued by the London based analytical company Law Business Research. The publication summarizes national gas markets in 36 world-wide jurisdictions. The chapter covering the Czech gas industry was included in the publication for the first time since 2003, when the publication started. The contribution can be downloaded from here.

Helena Navrátilová contributed to the publication Freeman’s Guide to European Property 2007 with an article focusing on tax issues in the field of real estate in the Czech Republic. The publication analyses the details of the property market in more than thirty European countries. The contribution can be downloaded from here.

Law firm Kocián Šolc Balaštík (KŠB) successfully represented Eurotel Praha (currently Telefónica O2 Czech Republic) before the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic against the Supreme Administrative Court’s decision in favour of the Antimonopoly Office for alleged abuse of a dominant position.

Law firm Kocián Šolc Balaštík represented FONTERON HOLDINGS LIMITED in sale of a majority block of shares in HELI FOOD FRESH a.s., a leader on the Czech ready-made meals market, and in establishment of a joint-venture between shareholders of this company. Bakkavor Group, a major UK provider of cooled precooked food, bought the shares and became partners with FONTERON HOLDINGS LIMITED in the joint-venture.

Law firm Kocián Šolc Balaštík was the exclusive legal partner for the seminar “Use of Extra-Budgetary Financing for Regional Projects” organised by regional offices of the Czech Republic in Brussels. The seminar took place on 6&nbsp;June 2007 on the premises of the Prague House as part of an extended meeting of the national delegation at the Regions&rsquo; Committee.

Law firm Kocián Šolc Balaštík provided full legal services to Heineken Group member Brau Union AG in its acquisition of a wholly-owned share in Královský pivovar Krušovice&nbsp;a.s., the biggest recent transaction on the Czech beer market.

Law firm Kocián Šolc Balaštík represented Indian pharmaceutical company Glenmark Pharmaceuticals Ltd. in concluding a deal via its Swiss subsidiary Glenmark Holding SA to acquire a majority shareholding in Medicamenta a.s., a company carrying out business activities in the production, sale and marketing of pharmaceutical products in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

Press release: Prague, 9 May 2007 Kocián Šolc Balaštík has been named Czech Republic&rsquo;s Law Firm of the Year 2007 in the Who&rsquo;s Who Legal Awards. This is the second consecutive time the firm has been recognised in this way, having won the inaugural award last year. In addition, Kocián Šolc Balaštík was the first independent national firm to ever win the award.

Professor Jan Dědič, partner of Kocián Šolc Balaštík, is one of top five most influential lawyers in the Czech Republic, according a poll organised by Hospodářské noviny.

A jury of professionals chose Kocián Šolc Balaštík (KSB) partner Professor <a href="./profil.php?id=2" title="Jan Dědič">Jan Dědič as 2006 Lawyer Of Year in commercial law from over 350 nominated lawyers competing in ten categories. KSB scored again in the second year of the competition organized by the Czech Bar Association and epravo.cz under the auspices of the Ministry of Justice. Last year KSB partner Jiří Balaštík won the 2005 Lawyer Of Year Award in real estate.

Kocián Šolc Balaštík (KSB) became a member of the Association for Foreign Investment (AFI) as of January 2007. AFI represents a select group of entities with long-term experience of the Czech business environment and providing services in key areas for investment inflow and implementation thereof. AFI’s main focus is assisting foreign investment inflow to facilitate the entry of foreign investors on the Czech market, and the group cooperates with the government agency for business and investment support, CzechInvest.

The current six partners of Kocián Šolc Balaštík (KSB) elected Pavel Dejl and Václav Rovenský as new partners effective January&nbsp;1, 2007. Both attorneys have been with KSB for a long time and are respected lawyers in their field of expertise.

Decision by European Court of Justice in Case C-173/03 Traghetti del Mediterraneo SpA, in liquidation dated 13 June 2006.

Directive 2006/24/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 March 2006 on the retention of data generated or processed in connection with the provision of publicly available electronic communications services or of public communications networks and amending Directive 2002/58/EC.

Judgment of the European Court of Justice in Case C-66/02 Italian Republic v Commission of the European Communities dated 15 December 2005[2].

Judgment of the European Court of Justice in Case C-408/03, Commission of the European Communities v Kingdom of Belgium of 23 March 2006.

Judgment of the European Court of Justice in Case C-406/04 Gérald De Cuyper of 18 July 2006.

New use of Article 21 (4) of the Merger Regulation

Judgement of the European Court of Justice in Case C-341/04 Eurofood IFSC Ltd of 2 May 2006.

Hana Heroldová and Jana Schovancová drafted a chapter dealing with regulation of advertising in the pharmaceutical sector in the Czech Republic for the publication The International Comparative Legal Guide to: Pharmaceutical Advertising 2006. In their article they reply to questions concerning advertising of medicinal products, rules regulating advertisements of health professionals and other experts dealing with health issues, including advertising of health institutions such as hospitals. The article also answers questions concerning Internet advertising in the field of pharmacy, including regulation of advertising of health technology. The publication was issued by the British publishing house Global Legal Group. The article can be downloaded here.

KŠB represented Cyprus-based Torpera Limited, a member of the PPF Financial Group, in preparing a joint-venture agreement with the Chinese company Sichuan Changhong Electric Co., Ltd. for the manufacture of plasma televisions. The agreement sets forth the fundamental parameters of cooperation in the joint venture between the PPF Group and Changhong and was entered into on September&nbsp;12, 2006.

Squeeze-outs pursuant to Section 183i et seq. of the Commercial Code have been a part of the Czech legal system only since July 1, 2005, a relatively short time, but they immediately became in principle a frequent instrument used for solving ownership structures in many important Czech commercial companies.

In the Czech Republic as well as in other EU countries, the first events from application of Council Regulation (EC) No.&nbsp;1346/2000 on Bankruptcy Proceedings have appeared pursuant to which courts of the member state in which the debtor’s main interests are concentrated are competent to commence bankruptcy proceedings. In case of a company or another legal entity, the registered office is considered to be the place where main interests are concentrated, unless the contrary is proven. A court of such member state can newly declare bankruptcy with effects in the Czech Republic in respect of a Czech entity with a registered office in the Czech Republic but with main interests on the territory of another EU member state without the necessity of undergoing the procedure for recognition of an insolvency decision. This also applies in the opposite case in which Czech courts can declare bankruptcy in respect of a debtor from another EU member state under the same conditions.

On March&nbsp;8, 2006, two legal regulations became simultaneously valid and effective which significantly amend the Commercial Code and the Accounting Act and have considerable practical impact in the area of law for commercial companies.

Negotiations concerning the draft order titled REACH, which regulates in particular the registration of chemicals by their producers and the effectiveness of which is envisaged in 2007, is in the final phase. This is a very significant legal regulation concerning de facto all companies involved in the chemical industry. All documentation concerning these issues is available at http://ecb.jrc.it/REACH/.

In the case of a lease agreed upon for entrepreneurial purposes, the lease agreement must newly contain information on the type of business carried out on the leased commercial premises. If the lessee wishes to change the type of business and if such change significantly affects the use of the commercial premises, the lessee may do so only subject to the lessor’s previous consent, unless agreed otherwise. The lessee’s failure to do so constitutes grounds for the lessor’s notice of termination, unless agreed otherwise. Neither the lessee nor the lessor may terminate the lease on the grounds of change in ownership of the building in which the leased commercial premises are located, unless agreed otherwise. In the case of the lessee’s dissolution as a legal entity, the lease newly terminates only if such legal entity was dissolved without a legal successor, unless agreed otherwise. (Effective as of October&nbsp;19,&nbsp;2005.)

The regulation introduced the so-called European Enforcement Order for uncontested claims, i.e. receivables recognized by creditors on the basis of a payment order or a judgment for recognition. The basic idea of this regulation is that if investigatory proceedings correspond with a certain standard, the claim arising from the proceedings can be confirmed in the state where it was issued as an European enforcement order. Such claim can be executed in another member state without the necessity of exequatur, i.e. recognition proceedings. The regulation brings evident advantages to creditors who have the possibility of fast and effective resolution in a foreign country without involving the court power of the member state in which they seek the claim, i.e. without delays and higher costs. The regulation is a part of a set of measures for further development of the principle of mutual recognition of judgments and other decisions by court bodies in the EU. (Effective as of October&nbsp;31,&nbsp;2005.)