Leading Lawyers On "Bullet Proofing" Businesses

Media Release
March 2009

Leading Lawyers On "Bullet Proofing" Business Seminar

Waikato-based businesspeople are to receive crucial guidance on optimal current business practice from two senior corporate and commercial lawyers at a March 4 seminar in Hamilton.

Mark Lowndes and Mike Whale of the Auckland and Wellington law firm Lowndes Associates will give attendees, including chartered accountants, advisers and business owners, timely advice regarding recent changes to insolvency law, and directions for ‘bullet-proofing’ their own companies and those of clients during the recession.

Mr Lowndes is the managing partner and founder of the firm, while Mr Whale is a consultant to Lowndes Associates and co-editor, with Justice Paul Heath, of Heath & Whale on Insolvency, published in late 2008.

The pair will examine positive steps available to businesses to improve their ability to weather the current financial turbulence. They will take a fresh look, from a commercial law perspective, at the ways businesspeople can manage both risk and key business relationships.

The seminar will also present the various options for dealing with insolvency and restructuring issues for the business, its debtors and other stakeholders – with an emphasis on practical, cost-effective and early actions.

Mr Lowndes and Mr Whale are addressing people at a time when the prospects for many businesses are grim: Insolvency and Trustee Service figures at late 2008 showed that personal insolvencies in New Zealand were up by one third on the same time a year earlier. The number of corporate liquidations and receiverships is also gaining momentum.

Mr Whale is one of the leading authorities in the area of corporate and personal insolvency, and will provide authoritative guidance on the new voluntary administration procedure. Adapted from Australia, voluntary administration as a new rescue regime provides an alternative, broader option for businesses which need to consider rescue or better outcomes than liquidation.

Mr Lowndes said the seminar would be helpful to all involved in navigating their way through the current economic problems, from lawyers to accountants and general business owners. “In addition to addressing all the options available to business in a financial crisis, we will be presenting a commercial law health check, looking at all aspects of this area of the law, from terms of trade, supplier and employment contracts to intellectual property, directors’ liability and business sale and purchase.”

The details:
Date: Wednesday 4 March 2009
Time: 4– 6pm
Cost: $60 (incl GST) includes refreshments
Venue: Genesis Energy Lounge
Stadium Waikato, Hamilton

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