The 13-member Japanese business team of A&Z Law Firm – including principal partner Sophie An, both vice directors, senior partners Eric Zhang and Peter Zeng – has completed its merger with Duan & Duan Law Firm in April. The team also consists of nine associates and a paralegal.
An, now the director of Duan & Duan, specialises in foreign investment, labour law, competition and antitrust, and corporate compliance.
In 2003, she established the Shanghai office for the Team-run Law Firm in Guangzhou and, the following year, separated the Japanese corporate department, which eventually became A&Z.
Before founding A&Z, An practised at Yishi Law Firm and Sinclair Roche & Temperley. Her proficiency in Japanese business affairs led her to serve as a counsel at the Shanghai Japanese Commerce & Industry Club and the Japan External Trade Organisation in Shanghai.
Zhang and Zeng have become equity partners at Duan & Duan. Zhang specialises in foreign investment, corporate law, and intellectual property rights. His major clients include well-known Japanese companies such as Kyowa Kirin, Sony, Daiichi Sankyo, House Foods Group and Aeon.
Zeng focuses on labour law, compliance, dispute resolution and foreign investment matters, and has advised Japanese companies from the machinery, pharmaceutical, electronics and logistics industries.
During A&Z’s 20th anniversary celebration in February, Shuichi Akamatsu, the consul general of Japan in Shanghai, congratulated the company on its merger with Duan & Duan and expressed optimism that the union would foster further economic development between China and Japan.
