This is where I present my offer of legal services, as a Lawyer without Borders. What I call the practice of Global Vision Law. The “Big Picture”, as seen through the prism of a highly-seasoned lawyer. With more than 35 years of BigLaw experience behind me, in 2023 I left my position as Brussels/Paris-based partner in one of the world’s biggest and most prestigious multinational law firms, Paul Hastings LLP, in order to practice the law in a new way. In my new practice, as an independent practitioner, I concentrate on what I call “Vital Laws & Mediations”.
International BigLaw Experience & Expertise in Europe
Multicultural & Multilingual
New Independent Practice of Vital Laws & Mediations
“Deep Dive” where Business Innovation confronts Regulatory Reality
I believe that I am uniquely qualified to consider myself as a Lawyer without Borders. Being of both American and French nationalities, by my early 30s I had lived in eight countries on three continents. I had studied and assimilated various languages and cultures. My formal education had ranged from the Silicon Valley (Bellarmine College Preparatory to the Ivy League (Dartmouth, Hanover New Hampshire) to law studies at the Universities of Paris I & II, as well as a year-long propedeutic program at the University of Athens and a year-long program at the Università per Stranieri, Perugia Italy. Since then, my multidisciplinary and multicultural curiosity has remained unabated.
I believe that I am also uniquely qualified to practice what I call Global Vision Law, the “Big Picture”. And thus, to focus, in my new independent practice, on Vital Laws & Mediations.
In the 1980s, I began my legal career as a generalist international lawyer. An international businessgeneralist who over the course of my career, did it all (except tax law): Basic and complex corporate structures and operations, M&A transactions, all kinds of contracts (employment, software, franchise), competition/antitrust law, distribution, court litigation and ICC international arbitration—you name it. In 1988-89, I trained with the European Commission’s Legal Service in Brussels and learned from the best of the best the intricacies of EU law (competition/antitrust law, in particular). In 2004, my legacy French firm was absorbed into Paul Hastings LLP, and I evolved with my new firm into the practice ofcompetition/antitrust law on a “BigLaw” basis. Over the next 20 years, I was the firm’s lead competition/antitrust partner in Europe, practicing as an EU lawyer but often on transactions having a worldwide dimension, and this on a multilingual basis out of myformer firm’s European offices in Brussels, Paris, London, Milano & Frankfurt. Today, independent, I practice the law and mediate fluently in English, French, Spanish and Italian (for many years now, I have been an active member of l’Associazione Internazionale Giuristi di Lingua Italiana (AIGLI, based in Milano), and have an effective working knowledge of several other European languages.
During those 20 years, I was engaged in the type of high-stakes competition/antitrust practice where you dissect companies and markets (supply & demand), products and services. A practice where you go to the heart of a company’s operations. Where you go to the point where Business Innovation must concord with Regulatory Reality. Systemic Analysis is a key in this discipline of the law. It is a Deep Dive into the business and the law. In some cases, you get the impression that you know the company’s business better than the company does itself. You develop a Global Vision of the company and its business operations. Its functionings are analyzed through systemic methods. You get to know what is Vital for it. From such experience is born the desire to go to the essence of companies and the law, in today’s ecosystem of exponential technological change. And the means to resolve conflict as it arises, in an efficient way: Mediation. To practice Vital Laws & Mediations.
Acutely aware of issues that arise in cases where there are contact points between Business Innovation and Regulatory Reality, Pierre Kirch proposes services under a multi-pronged approach to client needs for legal advice concerning the EU’s emerging Digital Regulatory Eco-system as well as needs for modern conflict resolution through mediation, notably:
International French lawyer | avocat international français
International business lawyer
EU competition lawyer | EU antitrust lawyer
EU technology lawyer | EU digital lawyer
EU AI law expert
International commercial mediator
Antitrust mediator
Technology conflicts mediator
AI disputes mediator
AI disputes mediator
Multicultural mediator