Recently, the Serbian Government (“Government“) adopted a Regulation on the Quota in the Market Premium System (“Quota Regulation“), and soon after, the Regulation on Market Premium and Fid-In Tarif (“Tarif Regulation“) and the Regulation on the Model Agreement for the Market Premium for Renewable Energy Sources (“Model Agreement Regulation“). This package of by-laws has been adopted to create conditions for the organization of the first market premium auction in accordance with the Law on the Use of Renewable Energy Sources (“Law“).

Kinstellar has announced it is entering the Croatian market by integrating the Zuric i Partneri (ZiP) law firm. While the local firm will keep its name, "ZiP is now a fully integrated office of Kinstellar."

On 17 November 2021, the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia adopted the amendments to the Companies Act (“Official Gazette of the RS”, No. 109/2021) (the „Act“) which entered into force on 27 November 2021.

For the last decade or so, the video gaming industry has been witnessing an emergence, and then almost a mainstream adoption of a revenue-generating mechanic similar, if not outright identical, to gambling.

On October 7, six leading labor lawyers in Hungary sat down for a virtual round table moderated by CEE Legal Matters Managing Editor Radu Cotarcea. The conversation focused on the current state of affairs of labor regulations in Hungary and their evolution over the pandemic-marked last few months.

CEE Legal Matters has been reporting on an increased number of deals in the Czech Republic’s logistics sector. We reached out to several Czech real estate lawyers to discuss both the drivers behind the spike in work in the sector and the challenges it faces in the country.

MSC Cruises Compliance Officer Maria Dardai has joined Kinstellar as a Special Counsel.

Not so long ago (12 years!) Serbia adopted the amendments to the Agricultural Land Act which was supposed to allow the use of agricultural land for non-agricultural purposes, mainly to support the growing renewable energy sector. Of course, this was conditioned with adopting an adequate Regulation by the Serbian Government, which everyone waited for since 2009. Finally, patience paid off and in July 2021, the Serbian Government adopted the Regulation on the conditions, manner and procedure for giving state-owned agricultural land for use for non-agricultural purposes (hereinafter: “Regulation”).

On 2 September 2021 Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC) announced a 225 million euro fine for WhatsApp and ordered the company to amend its practices within three months. It is the largest fine ever from the DPC, and the second-highest under Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

On June 14, 2021, CEE Legal Matters reported that the former DLA Piper office in Ukraine had merged with Kinstellar. We spoke with Co-Managing Partners Olena Kuchynska, Margarita Karpenko, and Senior Counsel Daniel Bilak – the Management Committee of the combined team – to learn more about the merger and their plans going forward.

In the age of digital philosophy, when the electronic management of documents become more and more prominent in both private and public sectors, digitalization of invoices is rather a logical development than an innovative approach in the functioning of the supply chain. Harmonization of e-invoicing regulation in B2G sector has been in effect for seven years in the EU, while Serbia established an e-invoice system in 2019, prescribing mandatory registration of invoices issued in commercial transactions with the public sector on the central registry of invoices (CRF). The most recent novelty in the field happened with adopting the Electronic Invoicing Act and its by-laws when a comprehensive set of rules regulating e-invoicing came into effect.

Looking at the past 18 months, as economies across CEE contracted, the technology, media, and telecom sector has been surging. A balancing factor for economies, it helped avoid a deeper recession. For CEE law firms, TMT’s solid performance brought in a steady amount of work, helping polish what might otherwise have been a lackluster year.

The Ukrainian legal services market has been buzzing with work in the first half of 2021. CEE Legal Matters hosted a round table conversation in which Partners at Asters, Avellum, Integrites, Kinstellar, and Sayenko Kharenko discussed the driving forces behind the workload and their outlook for the months to come.

Technological progress has a magnificent impact on everyday business life, and one of the things made possible by it is creating the opportunity for employees to perform work outside their business premises. But although technological progress gave employers the means to operate their business through remote work, the rigidity in incorporating this work model in practice was shaken only after the COVID-19 pandemic struck, making the expansion of remote work models a result of practical necessity. The sudden spread of remote work in companies also brought concerns of legal nature, and questions like what are the best ways to regulate contracts, safety measures etc.

On 4 June 2021, the European Commission adopted two implementing decisions (Decision no. 2021/914 and Decision no. 2021/915) which contain Standard Contractual Clauses for processing and transferring of personal data and are set in line with the General Data Protection Regulation (2016/679) (“GDPR”) with the hope of bringing about a higher level of personal data protection.

Despite the recent escalation of the conflict in Eastern Ukraine and its negative impact on business in the country, Anastasiya Bolkhovitinova, Counsel at Kinstellar, says that telecommunications and IT have been on the rise, and significant legal changes were introduced on tech incentives, foreign direct investment, capital markets, and agricultural land.

On 24 May 2021, the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia adopted the amendments to the Law on Planning and Construction (“Official Gazette of the RS”, No. 52/2021), which entered into force on 25 May 2021.

The standard approach in cases involving abuse of dominant position implies that the competition authority determines the market influence of the company due to which it can operate in the relevant market to a significant extent independently of other market participants and, provided that the company has a dominant position, whether its actions result in abuse of such position. The standard approach came naturally in markets that are geographically and economically limited. The core of the principle is that the public authority reacts ex-post (after the event) to abuses, by imposing the obligation to terminate anticompetitive practices or imposing penalties for prohibited behaviour.