“ A great lawyer balances protecting the interests of the client from a technical and legal perspective with a clear understanding of their commercial agenda.

Jake has more than 15 years of experience in cross-border M&A, joint venture transactions, and cross-border regulatory matters in South and Southeast Asia and in Europe. He regularly advises venture capital investors on investments in Southeast Asian portfolio companies, strategic joint ventures, and partnerships involving Fintech ventures. He has also represented issuers and underwriters on IPOs and secondary fundraisings across various Asian stock exchanges.

He has advised on numerous high-profile, high-value transactions for multinational clients such as AXA, Axiata Group Berhad, Chubb, Generali, HSBC, JT Group, MUFG Bank, Oriente, SoftBank, Mizuho Bank, and Standard Chartered Bank, and its venture capital arm, SC Ventures.

Jake is a frequent speaker on regional issues and trends in M&A in the Fintech, financial services, and TMT sectors. He is often quoted by Bloomberg, Thomson Reuters, and leading local publications, such as The Business Times.

According to his clients, Jake is known for his “technical strength, negotiating skills, and amazing stamina.” Clients have described him as “the kind you would love to have in your corner and dread if he’s playing for the away team,” and as someone who will “go above and beyond the call of duty,” who “has the right balance between protecting the interests of the client from a technical, legal perspective and understanding the commercial agenda.”

In addition to English, Jake speaks and writes fluent French and Italian.

Representative Transactions

• SoftBank Vision Fund in its US$1.46 billion further investment into the Series H financing round of Grab, Southeast Asia’s leading ride-hailing platform.
• Chubb, the world’s largest publicly traded property and casualty insurance company, on a regional contractual-distribution joint venture with Grab Taxi, the leading on-demand transportation and Fintech platform in Southeast Asia.
• JT Group on its acquisition of the tobacco business of Akij Group for approximately US$1.5 billion - at completion, this was the largest M&A deal in Bangladeshi history; and on its acquisition of the tobacco business of Mighty Corporation for approximately US$950 million - one of the largest M&A deals by value in the Philippines in 2017.
• SC Ventures and Standard Chartered Bank on various VC investments globally.
• AXA SA on its acquisition of Asian businesses valued at A$9.8 billion in connection with AMP Limited’s takeover of AXA Asia Pacific Holdings Limited (shortlisted for Asian Legal Business’s “Southeast Asia M&A Deal of the Year”).
• Axiata Group Berhad, the largest mobile operator in Malaysia, on numerous transactions across Asia, including:
  • The US$1.4 billion acquisition of Nepal’s leading mobile operator, Ncell (Nominated for M&A Deal of the Year: South Asia - The Asian Lawyer Asia Legal Awards 2016); and
  • The US$3 billion buyout by Idea Cellular of Dr BK Modi’s stake in Spice Communications, the merger of Spice into Idea, and the preferential placement of shares by Idea to Axiata (Awarded the Indian Business Law Journal’s Deal of the Year award for 2008).