On November 18, Charuwan Charoonchitsathian, counsel, and Gvavalin Mahakunkitchareon, associate—both from Tilleke & Gibbins’ corporate and commercial group—represented Tilleke & Gibbins as keynote speakers for a special focus week organized by the Thailand office of Plug and Play Tech Center, the world’s largest early-stage investor, accelerator, and corporate innovation platform. In a session entitled “Embracing Technology: Tech-Focused Legal Developments and Trends in Thailand,” the speakers discussed the latest legal developments applicable to innovations in the tech space in Thailand, including: artificial intelligence (AI), cloud services, and internet of things (IOT); data protection updates from the recent Personal Data Protection Act public hearings; evolving cybersecurity regulations; and anticipated legal developments on the horizon. The session attracted participants from startups and corporate partners in Plug and Play’s local ecosystem in Thailand (including BDMS, CP Group, Krungthai Bank, and PTT, among others).

On November 17, Tilleke & Gibbins conducted another joint TMT webinar with Clyde & Co. The event provided a multijurisdictional view in a session titled “Data Privacy and Protection in COVID-19 Times.” Lawyers from Tilleke & Gibbins covered the legal and regulatory environments in Thailand and Vietnam, while lawyers from Clyde & Co spoke on Australia, China, and Singapore. Atthachai Homhuan, director of the regulatory affairs department at Tilleke & Gibbins, explained emergency use authorization of drugs and vaccines in Thailand, as well as data privacy and protection issues related to employers, employees, and vaccinations. Waewpen Piemwichai, a senior associate in Tilleke & Gibbins corporate and commercial group in Hanoi, followed the Thailand session with a look at the evolving pandemic situation in Vietnam and noted how the processing of COVID-19-related data will change when the draft Decree on Personal Data Protection takes effect.

Tiziana Sucharitkul, co-managing partner of Tilleke & Gibbins and director of the firm’s dispute resolution department, spoke in two International Bar Association (IBA) webinars on law firm management and strategic direction. Tiziana appeared in her capacity as a member of the IBA Law Firm Management Committee, first in an IBA Global Showcase session on October 28, 2021, and then again at an IBA Officers’ Briefing on November 9. The first event brought together two panels of law firm managing partners from around the world to discuss the matters of greatest concern to the legal industry in a session titled “What is the Future of our Law Firms?” Together, the panelists discussed issued such as the return to physical offices, how best to serve clients, how to encourage and support collaboration among lawyers, and what pricing strategies will look like in the future. This session formed part of the week-long IBA Global Showcase—a global conference sharing knowledge and celebrating successes in law firm policy and practice. In the second session, open only to officers of the IBA, Tiziana was one of three guests interviewed about law firm transitions and strategy. Alongside managing partners from leading firms in India and the USA, Tiziana discussed how established family-run firms can evolve into regional powerhouses, taking examples from her own experience with Tilleke & Gibbins’ regionalization and growth over the past two decades. For more details on the IBA and the 2021 Global Showcase, please visit the IBA website.

Andrew Stoutley, chief operating officer of Tilleke & Gibbins, provided a lengthy quote to Asian Legal Business (ALB) for a recent feature on how law firms in Southeast Asia are increasingly using data analytics and information to drive their business strategy. The article featured contributions from a number of partners and executives from firms across Southeast Asia on the different ways that their firms are applying data to their operations and incorporating information and analytics into their strategic decision-making processes. In his contribution, Andrew explained that as technology has become central to virtually all operations at Tilleke & Gibbins, metrics and data have been harnessed to inform decisions at all levels. To illustrate this, he gave the example of a broad strategic planning process that the firm has undertaken to lay out strategy for the coming years. Identifying and gathering key quantitative and qualitative data points was crucial to the process, which considers every element of the firm’s planned operations for the next several years. Andrew went on to discuss the importance of determining how best to share the data with the relevant stakeholders, such as through visualizations or dashboards that allow staff to monitor the progress of operations. The other informants for the article reported a similar uptick in reliance on data—such as in competitive intelligence, billing, and matter management—and emphasized the necessity for firms to recognize the value of data as a resource that must be protected and used wisely. The full article is available on page 4 of the September 2021 issue of ALB.