It's April, and the Dealer's Choice forum and CEE Legal Matters Annual Banquet and Awards Ceremony on June 6 and the fourth annual GC Summit in Prague are only two short months away, making this the ideal time for a quick preview of the two most important networking and professional development events for the region's legal elite on the calendar.
The first-ever Dealer's Choice event, to be held in the Congress Centre of the Czech National Bank building, is designed as a unique and valuable networking event for private practitioners from across CEE, with special guests from the United Kingdom and China. The forum's agenda will focus on matters of high relevance to law firm management in the region, including suggestions for the development and strengthening of referral relationships between domestic and international firms, a consideration of the changing technology available to lawyers, a review of how the widely-reported political changes in the region are likely to affect investment, and a CEE Legal Matters Special Panel on Chinese investment in CEE. Needless to say, the schedule has been carefully designed to provide substantial time for informal conversation and networking.
That evening attendees will reconvene in the nearby Slovansky Dum for the first CEE Legal Matters Annual Banquet and Deal of the Year Awards Ceremony. The shortlist of deals — and the firms which worked on them — were announced on February 20, 2018, and the winners of the awards in 17 CEE countries — purely peer-selected, making them the most relevant and transparent legal awards in Central and Eastern Europe — will be announced on stage at the Banquet. The event, which will feature live music and a gathering of peers, counterparts, and friends from across Europe, is destined to become an annual not-to-be-missed celebration of the CEE legal community.
On the following morning, June 7, the annual two-day General Counsel Summit will begin at the Czech National Bank building. Over 300 senior in-house counsel are expected to attend this year's conference, making it far and away the premier event for in-house legal professionals in Europe. Slaughter & May will serve as Chairman Sponsor for the third year-running, an association that began in 2016 in Istanbul and carried through the 2017 Summit in Warsaw.
A limited number of tickets and sponsorship slots remain available for both events, and those interested in learning more are encouraged to visit the event websites or contact CEE Legal Matters directly.
Finally, it's worth remembering that CEE Legal Matters is hosting three additional one-day GC Summits for in-house lawyers in the fall of 2018. Information about the Turkey GC Summit, Balkan GC Summit, and Hungary GC Summit will be published soon, and in the interim can be obtained by contacting CEE Legal Matters directly.
It's a busy year for CEE Legal Matters, all part of our mission to be the leading source of news and information to the lawyers and legal community of Central and Eastern Europe. We look forward to seeing you all in Prague, Istanbul, Belgrade, and Budapest.