On 2 March 2022 we were joined by Dr Michael Hwang SC, Neil Kaplan CBE QC SBS, Prof. Luke Nottage and Hafez Virjee (short bios below) who introduced the content of the benefaction by Michael Hwang to the law students of the University of Sydney. The speakers discussed the development of international arbitration in the Asia-Pacific region, the place of Australian practitioners in this global market, and the benefits of pursuing international arbitration as an elective, in the context of the large range of materials made available to the law students through the benefaction on the Delos platform.
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
Dr Michael Hwang SC currently practices as an international arbitrator and mediator based in Singapore. He was the Chief Justice of the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Courts from 2010 to 2018. He sits as arbitrator in domestic and international disputes, including investment treaty disputes, under a wide variety of arbitral rules. Michael was called to the Singapore Bar in 1968, when he joined Allen & Gledhill. He became a partner in 1972 and retired from the firm in 2002 after serving as head of its Litigation and Arbitration Department for 10 years.
Michael’s past appointments include: a former Vice Chairman of the International Court of Arbitration of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), a former Vice President of the International Council for Commercial Arbitration (ICCA), a former member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA), a former Court Member of the London Court of International Arbitration (LCIA), a former panel member on the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) Panel, and a former Trustee of the Dubai International Arbitration Centre (DIAC). He has also served as a United Nations Compensation Commissioner (adjudicating claims against Iraq arising from the First Gulf War) and a Vice-Chair of the International Bar Association’s (IBA) Arbitration Committee, as well as a Council Member of International Council of Arbitration for Sport (ICAS). He is on the Users Council of the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) and Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre (HKIAC), and is also a Board Member of the Swiss Arbitration Association (ASA) and the Hainan international Arbitration Court. Michael has also previously served as Singapore’s Non-Resident Ambassador to Switzerland and Argentina, as a Judicial Commissioner (fixed-term High Court Judge) of the Supreme Court of Singapore, and as President of the Law Society of Singapore.
Michael has published two books of essays on international arbitration, which are available for download from http://www.mhwang.com/. He was educated at undergraduate and postgraduate levels at Oxford University, where he was a college scholar by open competitive examination. He has also been conferred an Honorary LLD by the University of Sydney where he commenced his legal career as a Teaching Fellow.
Neil Kaplan CBE QC SBS has been a full-time practising arbitrator since 1995. He has been involved in several hundred arbitrations as arbitrator. Called to the Bar of England in 1965, Mr. Kaplan has practiced as a barrister, Principal Crown Counsel at the Hong Kong Attorney General’s Chambers, and served as a Judge of the Supreme Court of Hong Kong in charge of the Arbitration List. He was Chair of the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre (HKIAC) for 13 years and President of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (CIArb) in 1999/2000. Since 2017 he has been the President of the Court of the Mauritius Chamber of Commerce and Industry Arbitration and Mediation Centre (MARC). Mr. Kaplan is the President of the Delos Board of Advisors.
Dr Luke Nottage is Professor of Comparative and Transnational Business Law at Sydney Law School, specialising in arbitration, contract law, consumer product safety law and corporate governance, with a particular interest in Japan and the Asia-Pacific. He is founding Co-Director of the Australian Network for Japanese Law (ANJeL) and Associate Director of the Centre for Asian and Pacific Law at the University of Sydney. He is also Managing Director of Japanese Law Links Pty Ltd and Special Counsel at Williams Trade Law. His latest of 18 books are “International Commercial and Investor-State Arbitration: Australia and Japan in Regional and Global Contexts” (2021) and “New Frontiers in Asia-Pacific International Arbitration and Dispute Resolution” (2021, eds, with a Foreword from Dr Michael Hwang SC).
Hafez Virjee is the President and a co-Founder of Delos. Hafez also serves as an independent arbitrator at Virjee Arbitration. He previously acted mainly as counsel. His clients have spanned the range of listed companies, private equity firms, tech start-ups, industrial concerns, State entities and treaty organisations, in disputes across a wide range of sectors and relationships, including shareholder agreements, joint-ventures, agency, M&A, telecommunications, tech, energy, pharmaceutical, construction and defence. Hafez is a solicitor of England & Wales and also qualified in France. He was previously at Dechert in Paris (with a secondment to Dubai in 2015) and prior to that at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer in London. He co-edits the Delos Guide to Arbitration Places (GAP) and regularly writes and speaks on international arbitration and legal risk management. He holds degrees from the University of Cambridge (M.A.), the Université Paris II – Panthéon-Assas (Maîtrise) and the University of California – Berkeley (LL.M.). He is listed among the Future Leaders of Arbitration by Who’s Who Legal.
