ZHENG, Leo
Senior Partner
Leo Zheng is a partner of AllBright Law Offices. His practice areas include entertainment law, sports law, domestic and cross-border investment & financing, and ‘Free Trade Zone’ legal services, etc.
Mr. Zheng is a leading lawyer in the area of ‘Free Trade Zone’ legal services. He provided legal advice throughout the establishment of the SHFTZ’s Overseas Investment Service Platform (www.shftz.cn) and participated in the establishment of the pioneering Hollywood Film Investment Fund of the SHFTZ by providing financing and investment-related legal services. Mr. Zheng acted as a counselor in the introduction of China’s first film completion guarantee by the Ping An Insurance Group to the SHFTZ. Besides, Mr. Zheng provided legal services for ‘Chinese enterprises going global’ in a project called ‘2015 Early Warning of Overseas Security Risks via Information Release’, for which the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce sought a service provider by public tendering. The more than 200 times of risk warning led by Mr. Zheng in this project won unanimous praise from the relevant administrative authorities.
Mr. Zheng is deeply involved in the field of entertainment law. By virtue of his expertise and experiences in domestic and foreign investment and financing, free trade zone legal services, intellectual property and other related fields, together with his in-depth understanding of how the movie and entertainment industry works, Mr. Zheng has provided legal services for many well-known PE funds, financial institutions, film and television media companies and celebrities in terms of business investment and risk control, cross-border investment, Chinese-foreign cooperative entertainment projects, the commercial operation, management and protection of IP, and film crowdfunding, etc. Mr. Zheng used to represent a film and television fund to invest in a Hollywood film, to participate in the film’s financing, filming, production and post-publication, and to negotiate and communicate with the film's production and distribution teams in Hollywood. Mr. Zheng also provided legal and business-related advice throughout and played a main role in risk control.
Mr. Zheng has invested in a number of Hollywood films on behalf of clients and participated in all stages, including but not limited to financing, filming, production and distribution. He has also helped lots of clients to obtain exclusive copyright licenses and authorization to develop movie derivatives in the mainland China. In order to gain thorough understanding of the movie industry, Mr. Zheng has served as a co-producer of several movies, such as ‘First Light (《第一缕曙光》)’，’Little Dragon（《小龙》）’, ‘Queen in the Headlines（《头条女王》）’, etc.
Mr. Zheng has also accumulated rich experiences and got notable achievements in the field of sports law. He has built up close cooperative relationship with the Shanghai Municipal Bureau of Sports and other relevant administrative departments, and has been invited to undertake a number of research projects and to give legal opinions on certain legislation. Mr. Zheng has provided legal services for a number of large-scale sport events in that he specializes in transaction structuring, incorporation of sport companies, investment and financing, event organization, and intellectual property rights.
In addition, Mr. Zheng is adept at overseas investment. He has designed transaction structures and organization forms for many Chinese enterprises going global, and has made his mark for providing innovative legal services related to domestic and foreign financing, such as finance lease, factoring, external credit really, and free trading accounts, etc.
Apart from being a partner of AllBright, Mr. Zheng has undertaken social responsibilities in various areas. For instance, he is a visiting professor at both the Shanghai Vancouver Film School and Shanghai Film Art Academy. He has membership in both the Research Association of China Property Planning and Management (中国财产规划与管理研究会) and the Research Committee of Sport Education and Business affiliated to the Shanghai Bar Association (上海市律协教育体育业务研究委员会委员). Mr. Zheng is a member of the Youth Lawyer Working Committee of the Shanghai Bar Association (上海市律协青年律师工作委员会委员) and a candidate member for the 2nd Council of the Sports Law Research Association affiliated to the China Law Society (中国法学会体育法学研究会第二届理事会理事候选人).
Mr. Zheng has many publications. In particular, he had several articles published in 2015, such as ‘Research on the Status Quo and Prospects of the Parallel Imported Automobile Industry（《平行进口汽车行业现状及发展前景研究》）’, published in the Shanghai Business（《上海商业》），‘Variables and Changes in Parallel Imports of Automobiles（《汽车平行进口的变数与变术》）’, published in the International Finance News（《中国金融报》）, and a bilingual paper ‘Compliance for FTZ Companies Operating Outside the Zone (《上海自贸区注册企业区外经营之合规性要点》)’ published in the CHINA BUSINESS LAW JOURNAL (《商法》). Mr. Zheng is a co-author of the article ‘The Supervision of Overseas Investment by State-Owned Enterprises Must be Strengthened in the Free Trade Zone（《自贸区须加强国企境外投资监管》）’, which was published in the International Finance News（《中国金融报》）in 2014. Mr. Zheng is one of the chief editors of a Chinese translation of an American monograph titled as ‘Understanding the Business of Entertainment Law（Author: Gregory Bernstein）’, and this Chinese version is about to be published in 2019.
Mr. Zheng obtained an LL.B. in 2001 and an LL.M. in 2010, both from the East China University of Political Science and Law. During July 2011-August 2012, he studied at the Missouri State University, USA and got an MBA.
Mr. Zheng is a practicing lawyer in China. His working languages are Mandarin and English.
Transactions and Cases
- Shanghai Theater Academy Hires ALLBRIGHT as its Legal Counsel
- Research Project Conducted by ALB was awarded Key Project of GAS
- Several Cases Involving AllBright Law Offices were Selected into the “Compilation of Selected Cases of Foreign Legal Services in Shanghai”
- AllBright and Shanghai Municipal Bureau of Sports Entered into a Cooperative Agreement on a Research Project Concerning the Implementation of a Blacklist Mechanism in Local Sports Market
- AllBright Law Offices has reached a cooperation agreement with the Shanghai Administration of Sports
- Legal Opinions from AllBright on the Registration of Private Equity Managers Got Approved
- AllBright Wins Bid to Advise on Shanghai Commerce Commission’s Chinese Corporations Going Abroad Project
- AllBright Advises on the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone Overseas Investment Services Platform
Professional Articles
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