The Dealogic Asia Pacific Project Finance and Asia Project Finance league tables for the first quarter of 2013 has six Indian law firms featuring in the top 10 law firms based on market share of deals completed between January and March 2013. .Amarchand Mangaldas leads both the Asia Pacific Projects league table as well as the Asia Projects league table with 11 deals valued at $4.7 billion and is ranked first followed by Luthra & Luthra, and SJ Law Advocates & Solicitors with 4 deals each, valued at $ 3.05 billion and $1.37 billion respectively..According to Dealogic, Indian law firms have a percentage share of almost 70.1% and 82.1% in the Asia Pacific Projects table and Asia Projects table respectively. In the Asia Pacific Projects table, Amarchand Mangaldas has a percentage share of 31.8 followed by Luthra with 20.2 and SJ Law with 9.1..Amarchand Mumbai Partner L Viswanathan, Head of Projects Practice says “We are pleased to maintain our leadership position in the project finance practice. India remains an active market for infrastructure projects and we continue to see a lot of growth in this area.”.Khaitan Sud & Partners ranks fifth in the Asia Pacific Projects table and fourth in the Asia Projects table with 2 deals valued at $941 million while Link Legal ranks seventh in the Asia Pacific Projects table and sixth in the Asia Projects table with 2 deals valued at $427 million..One of the deals of KS Partners that made it to the league table is the SBI financing of Jindal Steel and Power led by Projects Partner Tanuj Sud. Talking about Infrastructure financing, Tanuj says, “Insofar as infrastructure financing is concerned, owing to historic bottlenecks (such as land acquisition issues and delay in obtaining environmental clearances) and recent issues relating to inadequate and uncertain long term fuel supply arrangements, a general slowdown in appraisal of new projects and mobilization of funding has been observed”..However, he is quick to add, “With the Government taking initiatives, specifically directed towards improving the general conditions for infrastructure funding, in the recent past, and with focused policy making likely to continue in the foreseeable future, the general outlook appears to be attaining a positive dimension”..“As regards deal flow for lawyers, whilst new mandates were not as forthcoming as some previous years, generally speaking, owing to escalation in project cost and time overrun necessitating modification in existing contractual arrangements and/or restructuring of funding structures, the recent past has kept lawyers reasonably busy while presenting opportunities for strengthening of existing practices”, says Tanuj..Another Indian law firm to make it to the Asia Projects table is Clasis Law ranked at tenth position with 2 deals valued at $193 million. Clasis Projects Partner Ishtiaq Ali told Bar & Bench that the firm’s two deals included a road project and hydro power project..Dealogic has ranked India number one in Project Finance by nationality, with 41 deals having a combined value of $15.27 billion thereby registering a 13% increase in comparison to the first quarter of 2012..Below is the list of top 10 legal advisers of both Asia Pacific Projects Finance and Asia Projects Finance. The Dealogic data covers only infrastructure project financing.
