Commercial

The commercial law department provides comprehensive advice to private and public companies and corporate groups, and the firm’s clients include private companies in a range of industrial and tertiary sectors (including food, engineering, real estate, leisure, innovation, information and audiovisual technology) and public companies governed by private law (municipal corporations, semi-public companies). We place particular emphasis on the circumstances and specific problems of family enterprises.

The commercial law department offers advice on issues including the incorporation of companies, subsidiaries and branches; AIEs (Economic Interest Groups), UTEs (Temporary Union of Companies), European public limited companies, cooperatives, foundations, semi-public companies; and company transformations, mergers, spin-offs, dissolutions and liquidations.

The firm’s experience also encompasses the design of intra-company operations, agreements between members, shareholder restructuring, lines of succession in family enterprises, and any other contingencies arising from them. We offer comprehensive advice on drawing up and implementing family enterprise protocols.

We also offer direct advice to individuals holding positions on boards of directors together with representation in D&O liability cases.
 

Innovation and entrepreneurship

Few things excite us more than getting involved in shaping an idea. The firm’s extensive experience in intellectual property is a key factor when it comes to meeting the new needs of a market closely linked to innovation and technology. As a result we have a consolidated portfolio of clients in the field of innovation and entrepreneurship, (new) technology, biotechnology, pharmaceuticals and software development.

Our legal advice in this area includes:

• The initial design of the legal structure for the idea: corporate form, business plan and financing strategy.
• Arranging protection and exploitation of intellectual and industrial property and/or the innovation.
• Comprehensive advice about national, transnational and European tenders, especially for European consortia in the Seventh Framework Programme for Research (FP7).
• Comprehensive advice for entrepreneurs and start-ups. 
• Technology development and transfer contracts. 
• Advice about R&D.
   

Real estate and construction

Our advice about real estate, urban development and construction law offers our clients a comprehensive and interdisciplinary approach to every issue relating to land transformation, urban development, the construction process and legal transactions in the real estate market, with a particular emphasis on issues relating to housing.

As we come out of the recent property crisis we have to rethink new forms of access to housing.

Our advisory services are geared towards real estate companies and constructors and other companies (in the industrial or tertiary sectors) dealing with extraordinary real estate operations involving the transformation or construction of their headquarters or an evaluation of their assets, as well as governments and dependent entities and private individuals with real estate assets who are involved in isolated operations in this market.
 

Bankruptcy, restructuring and insolvency

The firm has lawyers and economists specialising in insolvency law who provide legal, economic and financial advice while representing either the insolvent company or its creditors.

As the lawyer for the creditor, we file claims for the debt, recognise or challenge it in insolvency proceedings, and advise on dissolution or composition with creditors. 

As the lawyer for the debtor, the firm advises the company before the insolvency proceedings about refinancing, asset investment structuring, negotiating with creditors and filing for voluntary insolvency, and we then provide legal counsel during the proceedings until their completion.
 

Foundations and associations

Advising foundations, associations and non-profit public and private organisations in general has historically been one of the firm’s main areas of practice. As a result Badia)advocats’ client portfolio includes leading national foundations that operate in areas as diverse as culture, education, science and development.

The firm’s lawyers are members of the boards of trustees of several foundations and are their secretaries and permanent legal advisers.

This department offers an extremely wide range of services from setting up institutions to their restructuring, merger or termination, drawing up tax plans that help to get sponsorship, and project creation, development and legal design in the use of the organisation’s assets for general interest purposes.

The firm also provides advice about obtaining grants and public funds from making the application to lodging appeals at any stage against denial or return of funds.
 

Intellectual and industrial property

Badia)advocats has a team of experts who provide comprehensive legal advice on the whole range of intangible rights associated with people’s intellectual and creative activities and their person, both in contractual terms and the defence of individual rights (civil legal protection).

The department offers general legal advice in various languages for authors, performers, publishers and cultural programmers, whether these are theatres, auditoria or museums.

The intangible nature of authors’ copyright, the diversity of constituents that make up this right and the dissemination of works through new technological media mean that it is increasingly necessary to call on expert advice and intervention in this area.

For this reason, Badia)advocats offers its clients a series of specific services according to each individual case: personalised attention, attending meetings with their negotiators, negotiation and drawing up contracts, resolution of queries in writing, drawing up reports, legal defence of copyright in court, etc.
 

Litigation and arbitration

The firm provides businesses and individuals alike with legal advice and representation in civil and commercial litigation. We take a preventive approach to cases by trying to avoid court proceedings and giving priority to simplifying disputes.

We specialise in legal representation in court proceedings or alternative instruments about commercial, civil, tax, labour and public law issues.

The firm’s lawyers have experience in mediation and arbitration and have defended their clients’ interests in arbitration held in national (Barcelona Arbitration Court, Chamber of Commerce, etc.) and international (International Chamber of Commerce, WIPO etc.) institutions.
 

Government, administration and urban development

Badia)advocats provides general legal advice to government and related organisations, especially to local authorities of all kinds, partnerships, corporations with entirely public or semi-public capital and public sector foundations.

Our public law department also offers general legal advice to private individuals in their relations with government in various fields such as public procurement, transparency, liability, expropriations, construction and urban development, housing and the environment.

The public law department also provides its extensive experience in litigation between individuals and government or between different tiers of government (administrative appeals for review in first or single instance, remedy, reversal, injunctive proceedings, constitutional protection, conflicts of jurisdiction or in defence of local autonomy, etc.).

Finally, the firm also advises owners, developers, builders and government in urban planning processes, intervening in all types of operations from the preparation and processing of general and derivative planning instruments; writing urban management instruments (land subdivision projects); advising on the operations of partner urban planning entities; advising on applying for licences for all kinds of land use and acting in procedures for legal protection of urban planning and penalties, as well as the preparation and processing of planning agreements.
 

Information and Communication Technology

The vast majority of the firm’s clients are successfully meeting the challenge of economic activity permanently linked to the Internet and wide-ranging and constantly changing legislation. The firm advises the IT departments of international companies and institutions and also small businesses looking for a place in the 2.0 world about all activities directly or indirectly connected with ecommerce, the information society and information and communication technology.

Badia)advocats believes that adapting to the world of information technology, communication and ecommerce is a crucial business asset and provides comprehensive advice in the following areas:

• ICT contracts: outsourcing, software development, source code escrow and technology design in the cloud, etc.
• Online marketing and advertising: creating the legal framework for social media campaigns.
• Ecommerce: setting up the legal framework for online stores, application of the Information Society and Electronic Commerce Services Act, drafting terms and conditions for goods and services, mediation in conflicts with ecommerce consumers and users, etc.
• Privacy and data protection: implementation of the Data Protection Act, legal representation against data protection penalties, cookie audits, complying with European regulations and compulsory audits once every two years.
• Representation in legal proceedings concerning technological differences: disputes in software creation, transferring exploitation rights to technology assets, breach of non-compete agreements, etc.

Tax

Badia)advocats provides comprehensive advice to legal entities that covers all their tax needs. The wide range of services we deliver include tax planning, representing taxpayers before the government and the courts, international taxation, transfer pricing and local and international VAT recovery.

The firm also offers a wide range of services for private clients designed to optimise their taxation such as local and international property tax, inheritance and gift planning and taxation of expatriates and inpatriates.

Badia)advocats provides tax and accounting outsourcing by handling your company’s tax and accounting management so you can focus your resources on carrying out its operations.

Finally, the firm can provide advice about corporate law tax issues: due diligence, mergers and acquisitions, restructuring corporate groups, family enterprises, economic and legal appraisals and advice on business internationalisation processes.