Cross-Border Data Transfers: Carve Out a Safe Business Success in China

Michael has more than 20 years of experience in advising international companies on their operations in and with China. He has profound experience advising industrial clients in various sectors, covering all legal aspects of a typical investment deal like market entry and joint ventures, M&A restructuring and exit. Throughout his two decades’ practice, Michael has been gradually converging his energy on technology-driven business and has built up his reputation and connections in the circle.

As the first Chinese partner of Taylor Wessing, Michael is now heading the firm’s TMC practice for China. Besides his expertise regarding general corporate and commercial matters, he specialises in IT regulatory and data/privacy protection areas. Michael holds CIPP/E certification as granted by the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP). At the same time, he frequently publishes articles and comments on IT and technology related legal topics.

Michael is Vice National Chair of the Legal & Competition Working Group under the European Chamber of Commerce. He also serves as an arbitrator of the Shanghai International Arbitration Center.

Michael studied law at the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing (UIBE), China, where he also completed his LLB and LLM degrees in 1997 and 2000 respectively. In 2006, Michael received his law doctorate from UIBE. In 1997, Michael was admitted to the Chinese bar. After practicing in domestic law firms, he worked in the Beijing office of a major international law firm from 2000 to 2002. In 2002, he joined Taylor Wessing in the Shanghai office. In 2007, he was appointed as a partner of Taylor Wessing.

Liam Jia is a versatile professional with the past 8 years advising European businesses on market access and business strategies to China. He has a solid working experience in project and operations management, financial and risk control in the EU context.

Liam is an experienced speaker and author of publications on a range of topics, including the environmental sector, SME digitalisation and F&B distribution. Great team player, generating positive influence on teammates.

Valentino Lucini is an Italian and Spanish lawyer working for a top-tier Chinese Law Firm for almost ten years. He is specialised in cyber-security, TMT, technology transfer, AI, IoT, cross-border M&A projects, and foreign investment in China, Europe and USA. In 2021, Mr. Lucini was appointed Arbitrator before the Hainan Arbitration Court and appointed as Mediator before the Guangzhou Bar Association in 2022.

Mr. Lucini obtained a Master in law (LLM) at the University of California at Berkeley, where he also obtained two certificates of specialisation in Technology Law and Business Law. Mr. Lucini obtained the Certificate of Information Privacy Processional/Europe and Certificate of Information Privacy Manager from IAPP, the Certificate of Information Security Manager from ISACA and CompTIA Network+ certificate. Mr. Lucini also obtained a Certificate of Advance Cybersecurity from Stanford University, School of Engineering (Computer Science).

Yan Sun is an Associate Director in PwC Risk Assurance/Governance & Internal Audit practice of PwC China.

She has over 12 years of experience working in PwC, performing financial and integrated audits in PwC US for over 8 years, and focusing on cyber security, data security, internal control, enterprise risk management, compliance consulting projects, etc. for multi-national companies after joining PwC China. Yan is specialised in serving multi-national companies from SME to global leading companies. Yan has successfully led and completed several CBDT projects since the CBDT Rule took effect in September 2022 and is driving the PwC internal CBDT initiatives.

Xiaowei Zhu is the leader of EMEA Global-to-China Program in Amazon Web Services. He has over 8 years of experience in China cloud computing market, helping various multinational companies successfully expand their digital business to China, especially for those global SMB companies who just start their landing in China.

Leveraging the strong China eco-system and G2C program from Amazon Web Services, Xiaowei and his team delivered extensive and varied resources to accelerating oversea firms China landing, including IDAC, Innovation center, landing partner, operation partner, etc. In addition, since 2020, Xiaowei has been continuously sharing his industrial observations on MLPS, ICP License, and CBDT to facilitate global customers’ digital application landing through Amazon Web Services China. He obtained a Master of Information Technology degree from the University of New South Wales.

Eduardo Bernal is a senior associate at Garrigues in China, where he specialises in cross-border advice and foreign direct investment in China and Spain. He has extensive experience in data protection, with a national and international focus. He also provides recurring advice on commercial contracts and general corporate advice to companies and corporate groups on commercial, civil and corporate law matters.

Prior to his move to Garrigues’ China office in 2016, Eduardo began his professional career in the commercial department of Garrigues’ Murcia office.

Eduardo has been ranked as a Rising Star for two consecutive years (2021 and 2022) by the IFRL 1000 directory and he is a “Certified Information Privacy Professional” by the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP CIPP/E). He is a member of the Murcia Bar Association.