After more than 30 months of tight Covid-19 immigration controls, Hong Kong has just recently loosened its grip on the city’s comings and goings in its attempt to replicate mainland China’s “zero-Covid” policies. The near-shuttering of the immigration queues at Hong Kong International Airport have some worried that the city has experienced a brain drain from which it cannot recover. 

Singapore, on the other hand, has been able to make its moves quickly and without first needing to get approval from a far-off capital city, and has ultimately reacted more nimbly to the pandemic – including putting out the welcome mat for the expatriate community to join it from its long-time rival. Expats have particularly chaffed at the travel and social restrictions imposed in Hong Kong. 

A CNBC report in April said that private home rents in Singapore had climbed 4.2 percent in the first quarter of the year, compared to a rise of just 2.6 percent in the previous quarter.  

“Anecdotally, we know that perhaps there are some of those based in Hong Kong looking to relocate to Singapore, and this is contributing to the increase in rents,” Leonard Tay, head of research at real estate agency Knight Frank Singapore, told the broadcaster.  

CNBC quoted one Hong Kong resident who said he was preparing to leave for Singapore, citing the Lion City’s reduced travel restrictions. “[Hong Kong] just feels backwards,” Jonathan Benarr, group director of real estate at hospitality company The Mandala Group, told CNBC. “What was once a progressive city, just feels like it’s no longer interested in being part of the international conversation.” 

CNBC also reported that co-working firm WeWork saw a nearly 13% jump in sales and inquiries from Hong Kong-based companies in the fourth quarter of 2021 compared to the third quarter, suggesting that some Hong Kongers are at least giving Singapore a trial run.  

There’s no doubt that Singapore will face competition in its drive to become Asia’s regional financial hub, and in its expected efforts to corner the market on services such as arbitration and other forms of ADR. Tokyo and Shanghai also offer the creature comforts required by the expat community, with perhaps better weather to boot.  

But Hong Kong’s loss will almost certainly be Singapore’s gain, at least to some degree. And that will likely make Singapore’s legal market even stronger than it is right now.  

With Singapore potentially on the cusp of change, we turned to IP professionals in the region in order to understand better what clients need today. Asia IP asked a large number of professionals – mostly in-house counsel and corporate legal managers – what they were looking for from their legal service providers. From their answers, we have compiled our list of Singapore’s 50 IP Experts, those lawyers who understand just what their clients need and are able to provide them with the best practical advice.  

Our list reflects a growing diversity of practices in Singapore, with lawyers from a number of young and relatively young firms receiving recognition as IP Experts.  

Not surprisingly, a handful of larger firms headline the list. Bird & Bird ATMD placed four lawyers on the list (Alban Kang, Pin-Ping Oh, Anan Sivananthan and Lorraine Anne Tay) while Drew & Napier (Siau Wen Lim, Yvonne Tang and Tony Yeo) and Viering, Jentschura & Partner (Adam Bogsch, Audrey Goh and Gerald Koh) each placed three. 

Several firms placed two lawyers each on the list: Allen & Gledhill (Pei Lin Low and Stanley Lai), Amica Law (Jason Chan and Winnie Tham), Dentons Rodyk (Catherine Lee and Gilbert Leong), Donaldson & Burkinshaw (Michelle See Hui Ng and Shy Tsong Lee), Lee & Lee (Tee Jim Tan and Maurice Cheong), Marks & Clerk (Gianfranco Matteucci and Matthew English) and Ravindran Associates (M. Ravindran and Sukumar Karruppiah). 

Twenty-six different firms each placed one lawyer on our list, accounting for more than half of all lawyers named. 

Most of the lawyers named to our list have multiple practice specialties. Many of them are litigators, while others concentrate on prosecution work or provide strategic advice.  

All of them have something in common: they are experts in their fields and, in one way or another, they provide extra value for their clients. They are Asia IP’s Singapore IP Experts. 

- GREGORY GLASS

Singapore’s IP Experts is based solely on independent editorial research conducted by Asia IP. As part of this project, we turned to in-house counsel in Singapore, Asia and elsewhere around the world, as well as Southeast Asia-focused partners at international law firms, and asked them to nominate private-practice lawyers including foreign legal consultants, advisers and counsel.  

The final list reflects the nominations received combined with the input of editorial team at Asia IP, which has nearly 45 years of collective experience in researching and understanding Singapore’s legal market. 

All private practice intellectual property lawyers in Singapore were eligible for inclusion in the nominations process; there were no fees or any other requirements for inclusion in the process. 

The names of our 50 IP Experts are published here. Each IP Expert was given the opportunity to include their biography and contact details in print and on our website, for which a fee was charged.