A collaborative, global team,
with a client centred approach to success.
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Our founding name partners share a common bond. Gerold Zeiler, Edward Floyd and Luke Zadkovich have sat together with their families for Thanksgiving dinner in New York the past five years. Over breaking bread, relationships grew. Ideas coalesced. They soon realized they share more than a special annual meal.
High ideals. Determination, passion and focus to provide the best services possible for their clients, with a collaborative, seamless and engaging environment for our teams. It is this – a client centred approach to success – that ultimately led to our combination. It is this approach that runs through our firm, Zeiler Floyd Zadkovich, and binds us.
Gerold Zeiler and partners, Hans Laimer, Lisa Beisteiner and Alfred Siwy, set up zeiler.partners in early 2015. They moved from a major Austrian law firm after decades of top-tier experience, with Gerold since qualifying in the United States (California) and Alfred in England & Wales. Christoph Schreuer, a world renowned academic and arbitrator in state investment arbitration, joined shortly after.
zeiler.partners has built a global reputation as a leading Arbitration house in Europe, with Gerold, Christoph, Lisa and Alfred receiving numerous accolades and awards, supported by clients and peers. An impressive eight of the boutique firm’s lawyers are included in the global Who’s Who Legal, four of them as Thought Leaders. zeiler.partners has been a GAR 100-ranked firm ever since 2015. Hans heads up the firm’s Employment and Industrial Relations practice, widely recognized in multiple legal publications as one of the best lawyers in these fields in Austria, such as Legal 500, Chambers and Who’s Who Legal. This practice area has been complemented by the joining of Andreas Tinhofer, an equally well-recognized employment law specialist in Austria.
Ed Floyd and Luke Zadkovich launched Floyd Zadkovich in June 2017. Both are dual qualified in New York and England & Wales, and Luke also in Australia (NSW). An innovative and unique transatlantic boutique, focused on the core areas of shipping, commodities, energy, logistics, commercial and construction law. Ed and Luke have decades of arbitration, litigation and advisory experience. The offering resonated and the firm has grown rapidly.
Damon Thompson joined Floyd Zadkovich in 2019 to head up the London office. Damon brings an exceptional mix of in-house counsel experience at an international trading company and top-end private practice experience in transactional and disputes work in energy, shipping and commodities. Timothy McGovern also joined in 2019, opening the Chicago office. Tim’s practice focuses on litigation of maritime, transportation and commercial matters, and advisory services on all manner of contracts in those fields. Both offices have grown the associate ranks under their leadership. Nicholas Paine recently joined to bolster our Texas and New York offering, with extensive shipping and energy experience. Following client demand, the firm also serves the US Gulf and Australian markets from its locations in Houston and Sydney.
Ed and Luke are recognized as leading shipping lawyers in Chambers & Partners, and the firm has won the rare recognition of being ranked in both the Legal 500 US and UK directories for shipping and maritime litigation. There is no other boutique or mid-sized firm that holds this honour.
Our firms merged equally to form Zeiler Floyd Zadkovich (a Swiss Verein) on 1 September 2020. They both came together from a position of strength and for growth.
The combined outfit operates through their five member firms under a Swiss Verein arrangement, which remain subject to the laws of their respective jurisdictions in the US, Austria, England and Australia.
Timing is such that our firm is well-equipped to assist existing and prospective clients with the full range of issues, claims, arbitration, litigation and restructuring that are arising, and are likely to continue to arise, from the current pandemic and global recession.
Also, the United Kingdom is reaching the final stages of its departure from the European Union. We expect this major geo-political event will continue to cause uncertainty, disruption and legal complication between the UK and EU. This was an early reason why we started to explore the tie-up. We are now able to provide seamless advice on Brexit restructuring from the perspective of English common law solicitors and EU civil law attorneys.
The legacy firms’ commitment to their existing fields of practice remains the greatest priority for all our lawyers. Business as usual in that respect. You can expect and will receive the same high level of service, dedication and focus.
We do believe this combination provides our clients far more value than the sum of its parts.
With locations in Europe, the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia, our Arbitration and Litigation group places us among the leading global law firm boutiques. We are well equipped to handle any arbitration dispute wherever it arises in the world, whatever the complexity or scale. Our client’s case will be serviced with multi-jurisdictional, multi-lingual and diversely experienced team members, as determined by the needs of the case.
Our Employment and Industrial Relations team now has the connections to serve and grow in all jurisdictions, building upon our award-winning European practice.
Our Shipping clients benefit from our new European presence, including our German focus, complementing our UK and US strongholds.
Our complementary Energy and Construction practices have come together seamlessly and provide significant synergies. These sectors require specialist knowledge and experience. Together there is a formidable depth across multiple jurisdictions.
For our Commodities arbitration and advisory work, we can now provide arbitration counsel in Europe, as well as the regular seats of London and New York, with sector-focused lawyers who know the commodities industry inside out. This is only a snapshot of our work in select Practice Areas and Sectors.
Our clients will continue to receive the specialist attention on their business through the expert skills and services to which they have grown accustomed. While there are significant benefits to this merger, our existing focus remains clear and unabated.
Clients will receive first-class international advocacy, combined with full partner involvement. Our innovative structure keeps us efficient, flexible and competitive.
We have the leverage of our lawyers working from key regions around the world in fully integrated cross-jurisdictional teams.
We have the unquestionable scale to deliver on sophisticated cases and projects. Indeed, we are recognized leaders in doing so.
Above all, we have the Zeiler Floyd Zadkovich common bond – our clients at the centre, supported by One Global Team.