Proskauer Rose LLP — Hong Kong

Cynthia Cheng

Cynthia Cheng is a local partner in the Hong Kong office and a member of Proskauer's internationally recognized Lodging & Gaming Group and Real Assets Group. Cynthia has extensive experience in advising global and local leading real estate and hospitality & leisure companies. Her practice focuses on the diverse range of issues relating to hotel, branded residences and mixed-use development projects, and hotel operations through their life cycle from the initial design and construction stages to exit, including the drafting and negotiating of commercial contracts (such as technical services, management, marketing and license agreements), and matters relating to intellectual property protection, employment and dispute resolution. Prior to joining Proskauer, Cynthia was General Counsel of the Regent Hotel Group where she established the in-house legal team, and was responsible for overseeing the Group’s legal affairs and corporate compliance. In 2018, Cynthia was involved in the sale and joint venture with Intercontinental Hotels Group with respect to the Regent brand. The transaction was recognized by the hospitality industry as one of the most significant hotel deals of that year. Cynthia has also previously worked as in-house Legal Counsel for Shangri-La Hotels & Resorts where she was involved in projects for some of the world’s most iconic hotels including Shangri-La Hotel at the Shard in London, Shangri-La Bosphorus, Istanbul, Shangri-La Paris, as well as numerous other luxury properties in Europe, Middle East, North America and Asia. · Lodging & Gaming

Yuval Tal

Yuval Tal is a partner in Proskauer's Corporate Department where he co-heads our internationally recognized Real Assets and Hospitality, Gaming & Leisure groups. Yuval also heads our Asia practice. Yuval is a general corporate and securities lawyer with diverse experience in cross-border mergers & acquisitions (public and private, debt and equity), long-term joint ventures, real assets and corporate and real estate finance. He advises clients on the full range of their activities including any form of financing, operational matters and commercial transactions. He advises sponsors and funds on the structuring, execution, entering into, restructuring and exiting of investments. Yuval has decades of experience representing clients on complex, first in kind transactions. His strength is providing original, workable and practical solutions that get the deal done. Qualified in New York, Hong Kong and Israel, Yuval has negotiated transactions in six continents and has experience representing clients on cross border transactions, including inbound to or outbound from Asia. Yuval regularly works with clients in various industries including real estate, hospitality, entertainment, sports, financial services, technology and life sciences. As an international M&A lawyer, Yuval has many years of experience dealing with complicated, non-customary transactions involving parties from different countries, cultures and legal systems. He has represented private equity and private credit funds, family offices, corporations and individuals in structuring, restructuring, managing and disposing of investments in Asia, Europe and the United States. He is typically called upon to strategize and structure complex transactions that do not follow a prescribed form or pattern. Yuval’s experience enables him to foresee future issues and clients have commented on his “ability to think seven moves ahead of the competition”. Yuval is also well known for his ability to broker deals between opposing parties in order to get the deal done, irrespective of the legal, business or practical obstacles. His efforts have earned him recognition by Legal 500, Chambers Asia Pacific and IFLR1000, where clients have referred to his “ability to play the honest broker to all parties involved, and to bridge the different cultures, legal systems and language barriers and to continually solve the unsolvable, is what allowed us to get this difficult deal done” and another stated “he was completely invested in the deal in a way lawyers seldom are, and his creativity and efforts allowed us to bridge considerable gaps between the parties and find common ground”. Yuval has worked in industries ranging from banking, real estate and industrials to fintech, biotech and hi-tech. As co-head of our Real Assets group, Yuval works with a team of over 75 lawyers from across the firm advising on real estate and in particular operating real estate related transactions. Yuval has worked on virtually any kind of transaction in the hospitality space, including mixed-use development and construction, acquisition and sale, restructuring and public offerings of real estate, hotel and casino companies. His experience covers traditional and more bespoke hospitality products such as hotels, casinos, branded residences, private clubs, nightclubs, restaurants and theme parks, as well as coin operated slot machines businesses. He has completed numerous high profile transactions involving the buying, selling and combining hotel operating companies and brands, including AccorHotels’ [EPA:AC] US$2.9 billion acquisition of Fairmont, Raffles and Swissôtel brands, its acquisition of Tribe, Australia’s first integrated modular hotel brand, Accor’s long-term alliance with Huazhu Hotels Group (also known as China Lodging Group [Nasdaq: HTHT]) and its strategic partnership with Singapore-based Banyan Tree Holdings [SGX:B58]. He also advised Formosa International Hotels’ sale and resulting joint venture with Intercontinental Hotels Group with respect to the Regent brand. Recent transactions include the acquisition of sbe and subsequent formation of Ennismore, a worldwide hospitality lifestyle platform which currently owns 14 brands and operates over 100 properties, and the subsequent sale of a 10.8% interest to a Qatari based consortium; a strategic agreement for the development of the Faena brand, the sale of the Mexico-based Hoteles City Express brand to Marriott for $100 million, the sale of interest and creation of a joint venture for the Delano and Auberge brands, the reorganization of the Sydell brand and Accor’s sale and long term license concerning the Accor Vacation Club. Yuval’s broader Real Assets experience includes working on specialty real estate such as the acquisition by Mori Building, a leading Japanese real estate company, of 11% of iconic One Vanderbilt office building; The Recording Academy’s (The Grammys) deal to develop Grammy Museums in China, a public/private deal to finance an office building in Delhi, India; acquisitions of hotels in Bangkok by a large Japanese institutional investor and a joint venture between a Hong Kong developer and an Asian based private equity fund for the acquisition and redevelopment of a property in Kowloon into a mixed use property including co-living and co-working properties. Yuval is a member of the Hospitality Development Council of ULI in both the United States and Asia and was a member of the Steering Committee of the Asian council; he was also a member of the Law 360 2020 Hospitality Editorial Board. He is a regular speaker at real estate and hospitality related conferences such as the Hotel Investment Conference Asia-Pacific in Hong Kong. Prior to rejoining Proskauer in 1999, Yuval practiced law in Israel, representing Israeli clients in transactions in Europe and the United States and European and U.S.-based clients in transactions in Israel. He handled transactions and other matters for major publicly traded Israeli companies such as Clal (Israel) Ltd., LifeWatch, Kitan Consolidated Ltd., Orckit Communications Ltd., ECI Telecom Ltd., Scitex Corporation Ltd., El-Al, Zim and Tecnomatix Technologies Ltd. Since joining Proskauer, Yuval has continued to represent Israeli clients on a wide range of Real Assets, corporate and securities matters. · Corporate Law