Vertex Chambers > Dhaka, Bangladesh > Firm Profile

Diversity

Vertex Chambers recognises the lack of female representation in legal practice. Hence, our firm strives to ensure a safe and conducive environment for our female associates, pupils and interns. Our objective is to provide more opportunities to young female law graduates who would otherwise reconsider joining legal practice due to a poor support system. If a female employee has to work long hours to meet a deadline, our firm ensures that there is a safe mode of transportation for such employee to go home. Besides receiving the legally sanctioned maternity leave, our employees who are young mums have the option to take a longer paid sabbatical or work part-time to enable better work-life balance. One of the founding partners of Vertex Chambers, Barrister Sajeda Farisa Kabir currently serves as the Sexual Harassment, Safeguarding and External Relations Consultant at a leading NGO called SAJIDA Foundation and also sits as the Chairman of their Sexual Harassment Redressal Committee. She has also served as the Chairman of the Sexual Harassment Redressal Committee for BRAC, world’s largest NGO, for the period of 2015 to 2018. Thus, our approach to creating a female friendly work environment is to follow a top down structure.

Client Testimonials

CLIENT: Gerard Adema

COMPANY/FIRM: Medair

TESTIMONIAL: I’ve been the main contact with Vertex on behalf of Medair since April 2018. Most of my engagement has been with Tanvir and I found him very responsive to queries, understanding of our context and professional in his approach to us. This has really helped us in developing key HR documents, moving our registration process forward and giving guidelines on how we should conduct ourselves while operating under another registered organisation.

CLIENT: Zahida Fizza Kabir

COMPANY/FIRM: SAJIDA Foundation

TESTIMONIAL: SAJIDA Foundation is a non-profit organization and has been working with Vertex Chambers for a while now. We are very pleased with the quality of their services. Their legal analyses and opinions are insightful, cohesive and very prompt. Through their client-oriented approach, Vertex Chambers consistently delivers practical legal solutions catered to the specific needs of their client. Furthermore, they have in depth knowledge about both local and international laws and as such, they can provide sound legal advice on wide ranging issues. We would highly recommend them to any organization seeking legal services in Bangladesh.

CLIENT: Tim Hayes

COMPANY/FIRM: Bircham Dyson Bell LLP

TESTIMONIAL: We received timely and in-depth advice from the firm and would gladly refer back to the firm in future.

CLIENT: Shafayat Ullah

COMPANY/FIRM: The City Bank Limited

TESTIMONIAL: Vertex Chambers has been one of the most reliable enlisted law firms of The City Bank Limited. The Bank has been consistently receiving quality legal service from the firm and they have catered exceptionally well to the needs of the Bank by ensuring timely delivery considering the urgency of matters without compromising the quality of the work.
The Bank is delighted to be associated with Vertex Chambers- one of the leading law firms in the corporate-legal arena and the Bank wishes its growth and prosperity in the days to come.

CLIENT: Hans De Vuyst

COMPANY/FIRM: Jan De Nul

TESTIMONIAL: Jan De Nul Group of Companies has been working with Vertex Chambers for over the past two years on various legal aspects in major infrastructure projects in Bangladesh.

They have deep knowledge and given us strategic advice on corporate, structured finance, international tax law financing and regulatory matters, setting up Joint Ventures, establishing Special Purpose Companies and all related aspects.
Junayed has been very helpful in advising our company and European law firm with his expertise in corporate tax law structuring the aimed transactions.

Also Tanvir has been deeply involved with his knowledge and expertise on regulatory and corporate law.

CLIENT: Francesca Lo Re

COMPANY/FIRM: World Bank Group

TESTIMONIAL: Mr. Chowdhury is working with the World Bank Group (WBG) since July 2017, supporting the implementation of the ‘Movable Collateral Reform Project’ in Bangladesh. His legal and technical support has been key for the progress of the project. He provided remarkable legal skills by developing with the WBG, a Secured Transactions Act package including: a) Final version of the draft Act; b) Matrix showing the input of various stakeholders; c) Executive summary regarding the objective and salient features of the draft Act; d) comparison with other South Asian Countries and; e) Commentary on the ‘Consequential Amendments of other Acts’.

CLIENT: Ishrat Ahmed

COMPANY/FIRM: British American Tobacco Bangladesh

TESTIMONIAL: We engage Vertex Chambers to deal with many of our legal issues on a regular basis. Since the services provided by the Chambers successfully meet our requirement and are provided on time, maintaining a high level of accuracy and integrity, we highly rely on the chamber. Their advices are specific and clear. We are very comfortable to work with the partner of the Chambers- Barrister Junayed A. Chowdhury. Mr. Chowdhury is cooperative and approachable.

CLIENT: David Ballegeer and Laurens Cools  

COMPANY/FIRM: Linklaters LLP

TESTIMONIAL: We have been working together with Mr Junayed Chowdhury and Mr Tanvir Quader as Bangladesh law experts in various legal domains, including tax law, property law and public procurement. Vertex Chambers has been very helpful in providing us with the legal advice we needed to structure the deal and to identify potential risks. Both Both Mr Junayed Chowdhury and Mr Tanvir Quader are very responsive professionals. Their advice is very structured and addresses the questions raised. We regard them as highly professional, determined and dedicated advisers in the legal market.

Notable Cases

Vertex Chambers successfully represented Grameenphone, a leading telecommunication company, in its claim against Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) for imposition of fine of BDT 300 million. The High Court Division of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh passed a seminal judgment in favour of Grameenphone by declaring imposition of the fine as illegal. The judgment has been reported in the Supreme Court Online Bulletin and Bangladesh Law Chronicles, a leading law report.

We represented British American Tobacco Bangladesh, a leading tobacco company, in its claim against the National Board of Revenue for demand of value added tax of approximately USD 18 million. The matter has recently been successfully resolved through alternative dispute resolution between the parties under the guidance of the High Court Division of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh.

We are currently representing a leading global online battle royale gaming company in its claim against an order of the High Court Division of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh banning online video games in Bangladesh.

International Capabilities

Vertex Chambers is the only Bangladeshi law firm with an international outpost – Vertex International Consulting (vertexicon.com) located at Sydney, Australia. Our Australian counterpart advises the clients on the laws of Bangladesh and specializes in international commercial arbitration, international taxation and planning, land and development including human rights, safeguarding, sexual harassment elimination, and rights based projects etc., crossover between law and technology and on all aspect of Bangladeshi laws. Recent work of Vertex International Consulting includes advising a Dubai based entity on establishing a US charitable organisation and advising a leading Canadian commercial company on potential money claim against a Minnesota based company and its Bangladesh counterpart for a value of over USD 7 million.

We are a member of Advocates for International Development (A4ID), which links development NGOs with pro-bono legal support through a range of international partners. We have recently assisted The Nature Conservancy (TNC) in the research of gaming and gambling laws of Bangladesh in relation to TNC’s 2021 Global Photo Contest. In a wonderful turn of events, a Bangladeshi participant won the first place in the ‘Water’ category. We also advised Sea Users Association (SUA), a Mauritian NGO in a potential claim against the State of Mauritius for massive oil spillage caused by a vessel crash into the Mauritian coral barrier reef.

A significant part of our clientele includes leading international financial institutions such as the World Bank Group, International Finance Corporation (IFC) and Standard Chartered Bank. We represent various companies of the Louis Dreyfus Group in their long standing litigation re international commercial arbitration in Bangladesh. One of our oldest clients is part of the multinational professional services network of firms, PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Our Managing Partner, Barrister Junayed Chowdhury has been ranked as a “Highly Regarded” tax professional for General Corporate Tax matters by ITR World Tax, the world’s leading tax and accounting practice directory.