During the last few weeks, several investment funds expressed their interest in entire portfolios of projects currently controlled by Romanian operators. "Recently, we came across several such funds, which want to buy portfolios of companies facing problems because of the difficulties on the international financial market", said Gabriel Zbârcea (photo), managing partner of the law firm Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociatii, in a discussion with the coordinator of Bizlawyer. This is why, even if the number of real estate transactions has decreased recently, Mr. Zbârcea remains optimistic, and says that the Real Estate field is going to be as interesting as before. "In order to solve the issues they have at home, the companies in difficulty shall have to sell, and these transactions are made by lawyers. Maybe they will sell at a lower price, so the transaction would not be of the same magnitude. But it is certain that there will be transactions in the Real Estate field", said Gabriel Zbârcea.

In his opinion, the fields which are going to be affluent over the next period are litigations, the attracting of European funds, corporate areas, infrastructure and concessions, public-private partnership. "As Romania has a lot to catch up with in infrastructure projects, concessions and public-private partnership should flourish", he said.

Gabriel Zbârcea says that Tuca Zbârcea & Asociatii has not been affected in any way by the financial crisis. "Everything is going according to the plan, the turnover is rising and the company’s profit is growing. We are still looking to hire good lawyers and by no means are we reducing our costs or our staff ", said Zbârcea.

Financial Times gathered recently the elite of the European lawyers and legal advisers, in whose presence it launched this year’s edition of the “Financial Times Innovative Lawyers” report. Alongside reputed names such as Clifford Chance, Allen & Overy, DLA Piper, Linklaters, Freshfields, Eversheds, etc., Tuca Zbârcea & Asociatii was “the only law firm in the Eastern Europe present in the Financial Times report for this year”, as underlined by the journalists of the London publication. Based on the balanced score and the aggregate 275 points obtained, Tuca Zbârcea & Asociatii entered the top of the continental firms on 3rd position, behind the Spanish firm Garrigues and the Dutch company De Brauw Blackstone Westbroeck, which law companies have been established in 1941 and 1871, respectively. The Romanian law firm received recommendations for a large array of categories, proving once again that it is a strong firm, built on solid business principles.

Tuca Zbârcea & Asociatii is one of the most active law firms in South-Eastern Europe (SEE) as per the number of M&A transactions intermediated in the first semester of 2008. According to the report issued by ISI DealWatch “Emerging Market M&A Deal Activity”, Ţuca Zbârcea & Asociaţii assisted in transactions having a cumulated value of USD 861 million, in the first semester of 2008.

Currently, the firm’s lawyers are involved in two of the most important transactions that were ever carried out in Romania. They are providing the Austrian company Voestalpine with legal assistance for a Greenfield project in Romania – an investment estimated at approximately EUR 5-7 billon – and is assisting CEZ Romania in two major energy projects.

The firm estimates a 2008 turnover of EUR 17 million and actual earnings of at least EUR 15 million. Last year, the company had net revenues of RON 24,744,471, of which the net revenues of the Bucharest office were RON 23,963,915, and the net revenues of the Cluj office amounted to RON 780,556. The profit per partner in 2007 was EUR 718,000.

BizLawyer Team