Dan Tan Law

The US boutique now has a base in Singapore

A recent addition to the New York and San Francisco markets, Dan Tan Law launched by former Latham & Watkins lawyer Dan Tan in July 2011.

A member of the bars of New York, California, the District of Columbia, Singapore, and England and Wales, Tan has a decade of arbitration experience at three leading firms: Latham & Watkins and O’Melveny & Myers in New York, and Lovells in London. In addition, he teaches international arbitration at Harvard Law School and at the Singapore Management University School of Law, where he is on the adjunct faculty. As of 2013, he is a professor at Stanford Law School where he teaches international investment law.

Tan is also a member of the ICC task force on arbitration involving states or state entities.

He initially brought in three other international arbitration specialists: Cody Constable, formerly of Waesche Sheinbaum & O’Regan in New York; Martin Endicott, formerly of the international arbitration and financial litigation group at Lovells and the World Bank in Washington, DC; and Yousuf Aftab from Canadian law firm Torys, who has worked on several ICSID arbitrations involving Latin America.

Tan says the thinking behind the project is “to establish a flexible platform capable of delivering specialist advice and representation on cost-effective and value-driven terms”. He says the firm will tailor the service offered – as well as the rates – to the client. Those who have worked with him pay tribute to his impressive attention to detail and strategy and “easy to work with” approach. “Clients love him,” one former Latham partner told GAR.

In 2013, the boutique established a presence in Singapore, operating a fully-licensed affiliate Singapore law firm, FocusLaw, which is headed by Shem Khoo, a former partner at Rajah & Tann. Tan says they are the only firms in the US and Singapore respectively to focus exclusively on international arbitration.

Track record

In its first six months of action, the firm successfully settled an AAA arbitration in California – reportedly for 10 times what the client was previously offered to settle the case.

Other current clients include companies from the US and Canada, central Europe, Russia and China in arbitrations under ICDR, ICC and LCIA rules seated in London and New York (one case is worth over US$30 million).

It is also representing the Palestinian Water Authority in what is said to be the first UNCITRAL arbitration under Palestinian law.

On the investor–state side, the firm won the liability phase of a US$500 million UNCITRAL claim administered by SIAC against a South East Asian state-owned entity (represented by White & Case). It is also bringing a claim against a central Asian country in respect of a US$300 million investment and another against a Central American company in relation to the expropriation of a resort worth US$195 million.

The firm also successfully defended listed US and Canadian companies in an ICDR arbitration seated in New York. Claims by Singaporean parties for more than US$35 million were fully dismissed by a tribunal chaired by John Savage and also featuring Yves Fortier.