Macedonian lawyers Tatjana Shishkovska, Aleksandar Dimic, and Metodija Velkov have joined the Polenak partnership, working alongside Managing Partner Kristijan Polenak.

After the announced reform of the public procurement procedures in 2017, at the beginning of this year the National Parliament adopted the new Public Procurement Law (“Law”). This new piece of legislation embodies the current EU public procurement rules and sets the legal landscape which is expected to result with transparent and efficient spending of public funds. The Law entered into force on 1 April 2019, but its applicability will be de facto prolonged in practice due to the start of the presidential elections.

“The talk about the entrance of two regional players – CMS and Schoenherr – onto the Macedonian market last year is still on everyone’s lips (among lawyers),” says Apostolska & Partners’ Founding Partner Emilija Apostolska-Temov in North Macedonia, who says that the presence of such law firms in the market will undoubtedly influence business, increasing both the quality of legal services and competition. “It also gives us a hint about investments coming in – such big law firms would not come without any plans,” she says. “They must know something that the rest of us will learn later. I think it will be a positive experience.”

The Polenak Law Firm has advised Global Special Opportunities Ltd. on its acquisition of the assets of ferronickel production plant Feni Industries AD in its process of bankruptcy and reorganization.

Law firm members of the SEE Legal Group, acting on behalf of Netlog Logistics, have completed a due diligence analysis of the Intereuropa group of companies, upon the announcement of a banking consortium that it is selling 72% share capital in Intereuropa d.d.

CMS has advised Steiermarkische Sparkasse und Bank AG on its acquisition of Societe Generale's shares in Ohridska Banka Societe Generale. Jones Day was lead counsel to Societe Generale, which was advised by Moravcevic Vojnovic i Partneri in the Republic of Northern Macedonia.

Baker McKenzie, ODI Law, Simkins, Covington & Burling, and Van Bael & Bellis have advised MHP SE on the acquisition of 90.68% of the issued capital of Perutnina Ptuj, d.d. Schoenherr Vienna advised the sellers on the deal and CMS London advised ING, MHP’s financial partner.

“The focus in the country at the moment is on the constitutional amendments to change the name of the Republic of Macedonia,” says ODI Partner Gjorgji Georgievski.

Ever since “legal tech” became a thing, lawyers have been dreadfully anticipating the time when technology will disrupt the legal profession. The media has been fuelling lawyer worries, and attention-grabbing headlines like “The robot lawyers are here – and they are winning” or “Lawyers could be replaced by artificial intelligence” have kept lawyers awake at night. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning in law has become the talk of the town, and for good reason, as the use of legal technology helps lawyers to get things done more efficiently and cost-effectively. Thus, it does not come as a surprise that legal tech start-ups are becoming the Starbucks of the legal profession – they are popping up on every corner. It is estimated that there are over 1000 legal tech start-ups worldwide and that the legal tech industry is worth USD 15.9 billion globally.

BDK Advokati and Kirkland & Ellis have advised BC Partners on its agreement to acquire a majority stake in United Group B.V. from KKR, which retains a substantial minority stake. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed, and the transaction is subject to relevant regulatory approvals.

October 30, 2018, Hyatt Regency Hotel, Belgrade

We are excited to announce that registration for the 2018 Balkan General Counsel Summit is now open. The event will take place in Belgrade’s Hyatt Regency Hotel on October 30, 2018.

The GDPR, which entered into force in the EU on May 25, 2018, will also have implications for Macedonia-based companies.

The winners of the 2017 CEE Deal of the Year Awards were announced at the first ever CEE Legal Matters Deal of the Year Awards Banquet last night in Prague. The biggest smiles in the joyous and music-filled celebration of CEE lawyering, perhaps, were on the faces of Partners from Avellum and Sayenko Kharenko, which, along with White & Case and Latham & Watkins, won the award both for Ukrainian Deal of the Year and CEE Deal of the Year for their work on the 2017 Ukraine Eurobond Issue (a story initially reported by CEE Legal Matters on October 2, 2017).

The western Balkan countries of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, Serbia, and the Republic of Macedonia share the desire to join the European Union. Two of these countries — Albania and Macedonia — are particularly close to accession. we spoke to several lawyers to learn more about how accession could affect the business landscape and the work of lawyers in the two countries.

Slovenia: Fine-Tuning of the Tax System

In the beginning of 2018, Slovenia introduced several minor and mainly administrative changes to its tax legislation, mostly addressing and resolving inconsistencies in the legislation that had been detected in practice. 

Macedonia has started the process of liberalizing and privatizing the energy market as an obligation deriving from the Treaty establishing the Energy Community signed on October 25, 2005 in Athens (the “Treaty”).

Tatjana Popovski Buloski, Partner at the Polenak Law Firm in Skopje, says the political crisis in Macedonia last year slowed capital movement and M&A transactions. “Everybody in the business community was watching closely what was going on in the political scene,” she reports.

Macedonia has started the process of liberalizing and privatizing the energy market as an obligation deriving from the Treaty establishing the Energy Community signed on October 25, 2005 in Athens (the “Treaty”).