The Legal 500

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii’s Structural Funds Department has contributed to the release of more than 1,000 pages containing the inspection authorities’ Notices of Findings on the application of financial corrections in the structural fund projects implemented by local administrative authorities over the last four years. Along with the Institute for Public Policies (IPP) and the Romanian Association of Municipalities, Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii has issued, for the first time in Romania, a systematic case law directory on local and county authorities’ management/control of EU funds.

Tax advisory firm Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii Tax, the youngest specialist division of Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii, has announced the expansion of its management team with the promotion of Alin Chitu to Tax Partner. He has more than nine years of professional experience with Big4 companies such as Deloitte and KPMG. Along with Alexandru Cristea, Alin Chitu will be coordinating all tax procedural matters of the affiliated tax consultancy firm, while working closely with the firm’s contentious administrative practice group and lawyers specialising in tax disputes.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii acted for Eureko SAFPP SA in challenging the decision of the Romanian Competition Council regarding a EUR 70,000 fine for an alleged cartel on the mandatory private pension funds market. A team of highly experienced pleading and competition lawyers from Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii represented Eureko SAFPP SA in its final appeal before the Supreme Court in the case of the private pension fund administrators v. the Romanian Competition Council.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii has made five internal promotions in a bid to further strengthen some of the firm’s key areas of practice, such as Dispute Resolution, Intellectual Property and Environmental Law.

Florentin Ţuca, founding partner of Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii has triumphed at last week's awards ceremony held by The Lawyer in Monte Carlo. He became the first Romanian lawyer to be named European Managing Partner of the Year. The citation singled out "his tireless and inspiring leadership" (The Lawyer).

At the annual ceremony hosted by The Lawyer magazine in Monaco, 88 independent and international law firms competed for 19 trophies. The honours recognise those law firms that have demonstrated outstanding operational excellence in the course of the past year, as well as law firm partners with impressive management and leadership skills.

During the annual FT Innovative Lawyers Awards gala, which took place in London at the end of last week, the Financial Times newspaper launched the 2012 edition of its Innovative Lawyers report, in the presence of more than 400 lawyers and in-house counsels from law firms and leading companies across Europe.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii today launched the 2012 edition of the Employment Guidebook, a reference tool providing valuable information on the applicable labour and employment regulations in Romania.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii acted for Passavant Roediger GmbH in challenging the award of a EUR 11 million works contract for the rehabilitation of Roman treatment plant located in the north-western part of Romania.

In an irrevocable decision obtained by Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii, the Bacău Court of Appeal approved the complaint filed by Passavant Roediger GmbH challenging the award of a works contract as part of a public procurement procedure conducted by a public water supply and sewerage company, Compania Judeţeană Apa Serv Neamţ SA.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii, the leading Romanian independent law, has made the shortlist for The Lawyer European Awards. This year’s event sees 88 independent and international law firms competing for 19 trophies. Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii has picked up two nominations for the “Law Firm of the Year: Romania” and the “European Managing Partner of the Year” awards, the winners of which will be announced at the annual ceremony hosted by The Lawyer magazine, the market-leading media brand for commercial lawyers and in-house counsel.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii’s financing work in H1/2012 outstripped the level reached in the same period of last year. Recently concluded loan facility agreements were secured for Olympus Diary, Carrefour Property, Espe Energia and Transelectrica. The firm’s finance team has successfully concluded loan facility agreements worth EUR 115 million in the past five months. It also took the lead role in advising on several complex restructuring projects of existing loan facilities, especially in the area of real estate.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii acted for Iaşi Municipality which entered into a concession agreement covering heat generation, transport, distribution and supply services in the city of Iaşi. The concession agreement between Iaşi Municipality and French company Dalkia was signed on July 6, after approximately four months of intense negotiations. Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii took the lead role for Iaşi Municipality with a team comprising lawyers specialized in PPP, concession and public procurement led by Şerban Pâslaru (Partner) and Vlad Cercel (Managing Associate).

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii advised ING Continental Europe Holding BV on the Romanian Competition Council’s investigation into the private pension fund market which began in 2007.

Leading local independent law firm Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii expanded its current practice in tax advisory services by launching a tax consultancy division, a separate legal entity to the law firm, combining lawyers, tax advisors and former Ministry of Public Finance’s experts. Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii Tax SRL specialises in providing tax advisory services and operates as an affiliate of Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii law firm.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii made ten internal promotions as part of the firm's annual performance review taking place in November. These comprise seven Managing Associates and three Senior Associates, effective from January 1st, 2012. The firm also announced the letting of an additional 917 sqm of office area, expanding its headquarters in Bucharest to support the firm’s future growth plans. 

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii has launched the www.noulcodcivil.ro blog, as an answer to the challenges facing legal practitioners in interpreting and applying the provisions of the New Civil Code. The move is part of a wider range of similar initiatives taken by the independent Romanian law firm, with the aim of familiarizing practitioners with the new legal framework that is part of the reform of Romania’s judiciary system, which also comprises the adoption of a New Civil Procedure Code, New Criminal Code and New Criminal Procedure Code.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii’s lawyers have been advising Erste Bank for the past months on reaching an agreement in principle with four of the bank’s five minority shareholders regarding the takeover of a 24.12% stake in Romania’s largest commercial bank, Banca Comercială Română (BCR).

The consortium consisting of law firms Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer has won AVAS’s bid selection procedure and will represent Romania in arbitration case no. ARB/10/22 before the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID).

In April, the Authority for State Assets Recovery (AVAS) initiated a bid selection for Romania’s legal representation in the latest arbitration case brought by a foreign investor before the ICSID in Washington.

The request for arbitration registered with the ICSID on November 19, 2010, was filed by the Turkish businessmen Ömer Dede and Serdar Elhüseyni, further to the alleged failure by the Romanian authorities to comply with the privatization agreement regarding SC IMUM SA Medgidia.

The High Court of Cassation and Justice has awarded the Property Fund the right to collect 15% of the dividends of SNGN Romgaz Mediaş S.A. for 2005, when the fund became a shareholder in the gas company.

On June 7, the High Court of Cassation and Justice granted the final appeal of the Property Fund, represented by Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii, ordering SNGN Romgaz Mediaş to pay the fund RON 18,510,458 worth of dividends, corresponding to the 2005 net profit distribution. Legal interest, calculated as of 2007, will be added to the principal debt.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii’s legal team was coordinated by partners Robert Roşu and Ioana Hrisafi-Josan.

The law firms Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii and Turcan Cazac held the conference “Romanian Investments in the Republic of Moldova – Challenges and Perspectives” at the Intercontinental Hotel in Bucharest on Thursday, June 2, 2011. The event was organized in cooperation with the consulting and audit company Grant Thornton and with the support of Finmedia.

In attendance were Romanian and Moldovan businesspeople along with officials from the two States, representatives of employers’ organizations, banks, investment funds, law firms, consulting companies and other interested parties.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii has promoted 11 lawyers to various roles, as part of the firm’s annual performance review taking place in November.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii has remained the sole Eastern European independent law firm included in this year’s “Financial Times` Innovative Lawyers – FT Law 50” report. 

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii was chosen as the law firm of the year during the ceremony organized by the prestigious British publication: The Lawyer.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii announced that it signed a cooperation agreement with Ţurcan & Ţurcan – leader of the business law market in Chişinău (Republic of Moldova).

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii teams up with ICC International Court of Arbitration in Paris to organize the first local ICC events to be hosted in Romania. The events focus on discussing the available dispute resolution alternatives to litigation. Various ICC guests, lawyers from Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Dragne & Asociaţii, along with the extraordinary presence of the President of the Court of International Commercial Arbitration attached to the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Romania will be part of the speakers.

The arbitral tribunal of the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) decided to discontinue the proceedings in the case S&T Oil Equipment and Machinery Ltd. v. Romania in which the claimant sought compensations worth more than USD 150,000,000. It is the third favorable outcome obtained by the lawyers in Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii in front of ICSID, in Washington D.C.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii scoops Chambers & Partners’ most prestigious European award of excellence - "Law Firm of the Year"

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii posted a significant rise in gross revenues from 18.5 million Euros in 2008 to 22.7 million Euros in 2009.

The figures do not include the income generated by its secondary office in Cluj-Napoca and neither the revenues obtained by the firm’s separate units of insolvency and intellectual property. Also, the figures do not include the amounts collected by Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii on behalf of various project partners in its capacity as consortium leader, those amounts being paid to the respective partners.

According to the firm`s officials, approximately 85% from the reported gross revenues came from the private sector; the profit rate stood at a healthy 58%.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii is the sole Eastern European law firm included in the Financial Times` Innovative Lawyers report and takes top ranking as the most innovative Continental European law firm in 2009.

Tuca Zbarcea & Asociatii (Romania) and White & Case (US) scored a major arbitration victory before the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) within the World Bank in Washington D.C. In the proceeding between Eastern Duty Free (EDF) Services Ltd. and Romania, the arbitration tribunal fully dismissed the action and claims for compensation requested by EDF Services Ltd.

As of 1st of May 2009, Mihai Dudoiu (33 years old) is Managing Associate with Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii and Co-ordinator of the firm’s Banking & Finance practice group. The appointment will see Mihai Dudoiu take on strategic responsibility for further strengthening the firm’s Banking and Finance practice group.

Before joining Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii, Mihai Dudoiu was Senior Associate and Co-coordinator of the Banking and International Finance Department of CMS Cameron McKenna for 3 years.

Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii Law Firm appointed a new partner and made other 5 internal promotions, further to the evaluations carried on at the end of November.

As of 1^st of January 2009, Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii will have 16 partners, further to the promotion of Şerban Pâslaru as a partner in the firm. The firm made another five internal promotions, as follows: Vlad Cercel became a managing associate, while Mihaela Ivan, Oana Zancu, Oana Cornescu and Răzvan Mircea are now senior associates.

Tuca Zbarcea & Asociatii from Romania has received the highest score in the 2008 Financial Times’ rankings of Continental European law firms. The firm scored a total of 275 points and was ranked 3rd in the Continental European Firms featured in this year’s Financial Times Innovative Lawyers report.

For the second year in a row, Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii has been recognized as the leading law firm in Romania. An independent panel of judges consisting of top representatives of the Romanian business community chose Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii as the winner in the Law Firm of the Year category from a list of 8 international and local law firms.

Bucharest, Romania - New appointments at law firm Tuca Zbarcea & Asociatii have brought the total number of partners to 15

Tuca Zbarcea & Asociatii announced today that Ioana Hrisafi, Levana Zigmund, Raluca Vasilache (Tiparu), Cristina Metea and Oana Ureche have been promoted to partnership. The appointments became effective on the 1st of January 2008.

From the beginning of January, 2006, Gabriel Zb�rcea is Managing Partner together with Florentin Ţuca, one of the firm's founders. Gabriel will play a key role in the development of the firm's business strategy, as well as being responsible for the creation of a powerful brand identity. Previously, Gabriel and Florentin worked together for 10 years in a well-known Romanian law firm.