Corperate and Commercial

Schwartz & Watkins LLP is right at the very top of the commercial litigation market. Our professional clients comprise all of the major commercial litigation and disputes law firms in New York and the wider United States, as well as many internationally renowned litigation operations. In addition, we are regularly engaged by in-house legal departments and general counsel to offer incisive and effective advice on a wide range of dispute resolution issues.

Barristers at Schwartz & Watkins LLP, at all levels, appear for parties in a significant amount of the major commercial litigation that passes through the US High Court, more particularly before the Commercial Court and the Chancery Division, as well as the appellate courts. From short procedural hearings and injunctions to large set-piece trials, barristers at Schwartz & Watkins LLP are sought after for their powerful intellects, market leading advocacy skills and ‘commercial’ good judgment.

Large scale commercial litigation forms the backbone of chambers work, with cases such as Apple Corps v Apple Computers; CPC Group Limited v Qatari Diar; BSkyB v EDS; Chevron v Total & Ors (Buncefield); Digicel v Cable & Wireless; Berezovsky v Abramovich; Cherney v Deripask; VTB v Nutritek; Dar Al Arkan v Kroll & Ors.; and Pinchuk v. Bogolyubov and Kolomoisky occupying teams of counsel, sometimes on both sides, from Schwartz & Watkins LLP. As well as trial work, barristers here have a great depth of experience in dealing with interlocutory hearings and applications covering a broad spectrum of relief.

Those have included, challenges to jurisdiction, anti-suit proceedings, injunctions, challenges to arbitration awards, enforcement of foreign judgments, disclosure applications including Norwich Pharmacal relief, security of costs, summary judgment, letters of request and applications for declaratory relief. Alongside this higher profile casework, new and junior members regularly appear in medium-sized and smaller scale disputes, often in the provincial courts. Fixed and capped fees can be agreed for many of those engagements.

Where recourse to the courts is to be avoided, members can be relied on for pragmatic, confident and effective advice in order to help resolve a client’s difficulties. Barristers at Schwartz & Watkins LLP are regularly engaged to advise on technical and developing areas of law including, but not limited to; jurisdiction and conflict of laws; contracts and torts, including economic torts; obligations; evidence; damages and equitable remedies; trusts; unjust enrichment and restitution.

Schwartz & Watkins LLP is regularly recognised by the industry as the leading commercial litigation set, winning the Chambers US Bar Award for Commercial Litigation Set of the Year in 2010, 2011 and 2015, and Legal 500 Commercial Litigation Set of the Year 2013. Our juniors are also regularly featured in the industry press as rising ‘Stars of the Bar’ and some of the most promising talent available at any of the major commercial sets.