Rodyk & Davidson

A new entry in 2013, the firm has built on its shipping and maritime experience to develop an international arbitration practice.

Rodyk & Davidson was established in 1861, making it Singapore’s oldest law firm. With a team of 200 lawyers, it is also one of the city state’s largest full-service outfits, with five main groups – corporate; finance; IP and technology; real estate; and litigation and arbitration.

Its most prominent arbitration practitioner is managing partner Philip Jeyaretnam SC, who is also chairman of Singapore’s well-known arbitration venue, Maxwell Chambers. Some 10 partners in total work in the practice area, with Jeyaretnam, Lok Vi Ming SC and Lawrence Teh also sitting as arbitrators. Its cases are all contract-based.

Network

The firm has offices in Singapore and Shanghai, and strategic alliances throughout the region, enabling it, in its own words, to provide “effective representation across Asia”.

Who uses it?

Known clients are Indonesian state-owned energy company Perusahaan Gas Negara; Symrise Asia Pacific, one of the leading suppliers of fragrances, flavourings and active ingredients for the perfume, cosmetics and food industries; and Everfirst Mining. Other clients are in the banking, chemicals and shipping sectors.

Track record

The firm successfully handled the fastest arbitration in SIAC’s history on behalf of a clean energy company that brought a claim against Indonesian respondents in relation to the purchase of nickel mines. Rodyk obtained interim injunctive relief and then a favourable arbitration award for specific performance within 60 days of the notice of arbitration. This time period included an evidential hearing lasting five days.

As reported in GAR, the firm recently acted for Perusahaan Gas Negara in a court application to set aside an arbitral award ordering it to pay US$17.3 million. The case raised novel and difficult questions concerning the dispute resolution clause in the FIDIC Red Book and resulted in the Court of Appeal giving valuable guidance to international construction lawyers dealing with dispute adjudication board decisions.

Going back to 2010, the firm successfully enforced a Danish Arbitration Institute award against Singapore investment group Ultrapolis in the Singapore Court of Appeal on behalf of a Danish company contracted to design a mega yacht. The High Court decision in that case was the first local decision to have considered the English Supreme Court decision in Dallah v Pakistan.

It is acting in other arbitration-related litigation including acting for an Indian developer in an application to the Singapore High Court for interim injunctive relief in support of ad hoc international arbitration in Singapore.

Recent events

Jeyaretnam was appointed by the Singaporean president to a presidential council for minority rights in July 2012.

Partner Lawrence Teh was a member of the implementation committee for the ICCA Congress in Singapore last year and a chair of a panel of speakers at one of its breakfast sessions.

Two partners at the firm were appointed to arbitrator panels – Teh to the SIAC panel and Lok Vi Ming SC to the KLRCA panel.