Between around 2001-2011, certain private electricity suppliers (the “smart guys”, as they were called by the press) entered into long-term (10-15 years) bilateral power purchase agreements (“PPAs”) with state-owned producers (amongst which, notably Hidroelectrica) under quite unfavorable conditions for the latter.  Basically, the “smart guys” used to buy electricity from the state-owned producers at very low prices while making large profits by re-selling this cheap electricity at much higher market prices. Such PPAs were directly negotiated between the parties outside an organized market (the whole process and the contract itself being a private and confidential matter) and many of them were loss making for the selling state-owned producers (for instance, Hidroelectrica filed for insolvency and unilaterally terminated all such contracts eventually).

On Thursday, 16 April 2020, the Romanian Government adopted a new emergency ordinance, no. 48/2020 ("the Ordinance"), to help businesses successfully overcome the challenges of this difficult period.

Considering that the Draft Emergency Ordinance on certain measures related to corporate law (the ”Draft Emergency Ordinance”) has been launched for public debate and proposes various measures aiming to help Romanian companies in the Covid-19 outbreak context (for example, the possibility for holding virtual shareholder meetings even if such possibility is not reflected in the company’s articles of incorporation), MPR½Partners has proposed further amendments in this regard, for the purpose of assisting companies with other formalities that are difficult to achieve in the current context.

Former Mares Danilescu Mares Partner, Lucian Danilescu, has joined forces with Andreea-Oana Hulub to launch Danilescu Hulub & Partners - a new boutique focusing on transportation. 

“The Corona Bubble is taking up most of our life in Romania these days,“ begins Sebastian Gutiu, Managing Partner of Schoenherr’s Bucharest office. “Everything is more or less related to it.“

The issue of the protection of airline passengers has been an international priority ever since air travel has become the fastest and safest way to travel long distances.

Laurentiu Pachiu and his Pachiu and Associates team have joined PwC's Romanian affiliate, D&B David si Baias.

On 3 April 2020, Law no. 37/2020 for the amendment of Article 139 of the Labour Code and Article 94 of the National Education Law no. 1/2011 was published in the Official Gazette of Romania, Part I, no. 280 of 3 April 2020.

Dentons, DGKV, Karanovic & Partners, and Ilej & Partners in cooperation with Karanovic & Partners advised Hungary's Optima Befektesi Alapkezelo on its acquisition of a 61.49% share in Globe Trade Centre S.A. from Lone Star Funds. Schoenherr advised the sellers on the deal.

Six CEE-based lawyers — Agnieszka Skorupinska, Jakub Podkowa, and Jakub Wieczorek in Warsaw, Natalia Kushniruk in Kyiv, Roxana Fratila in Bucharest, and Artashes Oganov in Moscow — are among the 41 worldwide that CMS has promoted to the firm's partnership as part of its 2020 round.

BPV Grigorescu Stefanica has successfully represented Mondialacqua SRL before the court of the first instance in Romania in a dispute over a utility model for a public water fountain technically similar to a Mondialacqua product.

Regulation (EU) 2015/2120 of the European Parliament and of the Council laying down measures concerning open internet access and amending Directive 2002/22/EC on universal service and users’ rights relating to electronic communications networks and services and Regulation (EU) No 531/2012 on roaming on public mobile communications networks within the Union (“Net Neutrality Regulation”) has as a main scope to safeguard equal and non-discriminatory treatment of traffic in the provision of internet access services and related end-users’ rights.

Contributed by Filip and Company.

Reff & Associates has advised Forum Serdika, a Dutch financial holding group owned by British investment fund East Balkan Properties, on its sale of the Equest Logistic industrial park to CTP Bucharest. NNDKP advised the buyers on the deal, which was valued at approximately EUR 30 million.

On March 11, 2020, CEE Legal Matters reported that Kinstellar had advised FirstFarms on its acquisition of agricultural land in Romania from NCH Capital. We spoke to Anders Noergaard, the Group CEO of First Farms, about the deal.

In the context of constant evolution of regulations in the aviation field at European level, Romania enacted Law no. 21/2020 regarding the New Airline Code on March 19, 2020 (“New Airline Code”). The New Airline Code is by far one of the most important national regulatory instruments, being designed as an integrated civil-military air code, flexible enough to allow the application or implementation of the present and future European regulations.

The COVID-19 pandemic is expected to impact the process, timeline and documentation of M&A transactions in the turbulent times ahead of us. Below are some techniques for parties to protect themselves in the current crisis.

Pursuant to Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (“General Data Protection Regulation”), controllers must only use processors that provide sufficient guarantees regarding their capability to implement appropriate technical and organizational measures to ensure that all processing activities are performed and protected in line with the legal requirements.