Alvin Tang Law Office

On the court record

Alvin Tang Law Office appears in the reported judgments as a company and commercial-litigation practice with a strong appellate element, dividing its work between the High Court (Mahkamah Tinggi) and the Court of Appeal (Mahkamah Rayuan). Company law is the defining strand of its corpus, and minority oppression recurs prominently, including a Court of Appeal matter on whether the removal of a shareholder from management, with his shares locked in, was oppressive, and the remedies that follow such a finding. The firm also appears in corporate insolvency, including the rejection of a proof of debt by a liquidator and the application that follows, and the conversion of a members' voluntary winding up. Its civil-procedure work includes an application for a Mareva freezing injunction and the requirements a claimant must satisfy to obtain one, and an application to give evidence by way of remote communication technology under the Chief Justice's Practice Direction, a matter reflecting the modernisation of court procedure. A distinct strand concerns employment law, including the dismissal and suspension of employees and a reference to the Industrial Court, and an originating summons founded on a letter of undertaking said to be supported by inadequate consideration. The counterparties in the corpus include private companies and their controllers. Acting for respondents, appellants, plaintiffs, interveners and defendants across these matters, the firm presents as a corporate-disputes practice whose corpus centres on shareholder oppression and insolvency, supported by freezing-injunction, employment and procedural work, with a substantial share of its matters carried to the Court of Appeal. The oppression matters in particular require the court to weigh whether the conduct of those in control was unfairly prejudicial to a minority shareholder, and whether locking a departing participant into an illiquid holding while excluding him from the management of the company crosses the line into conduct the court will relieve against.