Professional Experience

Mr. Chenhao (Richard) Yuan is a partner at Shanghai Gao Kai Law Firm with over five years of legal experience, specializing in complex commercial dispute resolution, compliance investigations, labor and employment, corporate governance, and investment and M&A.

Mr. Yuan has represented clients in numerous complex commercial litigations and arbitrations, as well as asset preservation and enforcement matters, with substantial hands-on experience in dispute resolution. He has long provided corporate compliance services to clients, covering compliance system building, ad hoc compliance advice, internal fraud investigations, labor compliance, corporate control contests and public opinion crisis response.

Mr. Yuan has also been deeply involved in multiple investment and M&A, equity transfer, joint venture establishment and liquidation/deregistration projects, and is familiar with various corporate matters.

Practice Areas

Dispute Resolution (Commercial Litigation and Arbitration)

Compliance Investigations, Corporate Compliance and Regulatory Response

Labor and Employment, Corporate Governance

Investment and M&A

Bar Admissions

PRC Bar Admission

Education

East China University of Political Science and Law, LL.M. (2019-2022)

Henan University of Economics and Law, LL.B. (2014-2018)

Language

Chinese and English

Work Experience

Partner, Shanghai Gao Kai Law Firm (2026/10 – Present)

Lawyer, Zhong Lun Law Firm (Shanghai) (2021/09 – 2026/09)

Intern, Investment Banking Department, Guotai Junan Securities (now Guotai Haitong Securities) (2021/01 – 2021/06)

Trainee Lawyer, Financial Business Department, Beijing DeHeng (Zhengzhou) Law Firm (2019/01 – 2019/06)

Representative Work

Dispute Resolution (Commercial Litigation and Arbitration):

• Representing Luckin Coffee in multiple trust dispute litigations securing favorable judgments. The series of cases involves claims exceeding RMB 1 billion, covering investment arrangements such as trust investment, financial leasing, distribution in kind, equity repurchase, securities pledge and shortfall make-up, and assisting the client in resolving numerous legal issues including shareholder qualification, validity of guarantees, culpa in contrahendo, restitution in kind, bankruptcy claim recovery, share valuation and auction.
• Represented Komatsu, a globally renowned construction machinery company, in a complex commercial arbitration dispute with its sales agent and secured a favorable award. In this case, by meticulously dissecting multiple legal issues including complex financial leasing and repurchase guarantee arrangements, the validity of assignment of claims, and jurisdiction conflicts among multiple related agreements, and by reviewing each of more than one hundred claims and their recovery status, successfully persuaded the arbitral tribunal to adopt the client's core positions and dismiss all of the counterparty's arbitration claims, avoiding economic claims exceeding RMB 100 million and earning high recognition from the client.
• Assisting an advanced optoelectronic component manufacturer in an unjust enrichment dispute involving cross-border parallel litigation and securing a favorable judgment. This case is the first in which a mainland Chinese court recognized the substantive res judicata effect of a Hong Kong judgment that had not been recognized and enforced in the mainland, and has been hailed by the legal community as a landmark precedent for mainland courts to respond to malicious cross-border parallel litigation.
• Assisting a banking subsidiary in applying to a mainland court for asset preservation in support of arbitration proceedings before the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre (HKIAC), with satisfactory results.
• Assisting TE Connectivity, EnerSys and Shulan Medical Group in supplier disputes, distributor disputes and cooperation partner disputes respectively.
• Representing clients in multiple labor arbitration and litigation cases, and providing labor compliance advice covering non-compete restrictions, employee transfer and termination of employment. For example, representing a well-known quantitative private fund and a multinational media company in labor disputes and reputation infringement cases with satisfactory results, and representing a globally renowned telecommunications company in a series of labor arbitrations and securing favorable outcomes.

Corporate Compliance and Compliance Investigations:

• Compliance Investigation: Assisting multiple foreign-invested enterprise clients in conducting internal compliance investigations, including cross-departmental collusion and fraud investigations, executive corruption investigations, employee misconduct investigations and supplier bribery investigations; and assisting a Sino-foreign joint university in conducting employee conflict and misconduct investigations.
• Regulatory Compliance: Drafting more than twenty compliance research memos and legal opinions, covering topics including the impact of restricted high-consumption and dishonest status of actual controllers of acquisition targets, exit of multi-party cooperation agreements, strategic placement of listed companies, combating parallel imports, public opinion rights protection, anti-money laundering and consumer protection, alternative cross-border payment channels, cross-border parcel insurance cooperation models, virtual currency regulation, second-hand product labeling compliance, and recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments.
• Labor Compliance: Providing labor compliance services to multiple enterprises, covering non-compete restrictions, employee transfer and negotiation of employment termination.
• General Counsel: Providing long-term general counsel services to multiple enterprises, helping them build department-wide compliance systems, complete compliance self-assessment and rectification, and providing day-to-day legal advice and regular compliance training.
• Pharmaceutical Compliance: Providing legal services to multinational pharmaceutical, medical device and cosmetics companies including Lilly, Medtronic, Baxter, AbbVie, SciClone, Merz, Chiesi and Estée Lauder, and being familiar with relevant regulations and enforcement practices in the pharmaceutical industry.
• Data Compliance: Leading personal information protection impact assessments (PIA) and drafting bilingual (Chinese and English) reports for multiple multinational enterprises including Motorola; assisting a multinational medical aesthetics company in building its data compliance system and providing a series of legal services on data compliance for its international multi-center clinical trial projects; providing GDPR/PIPL data compliance training to J&T Express, a cross-border logistics company; and providing compliance opinions on data export and remote network access systems for Ferguson, with proficiency in data compliance rules and practices.

Investment and M&A:

• Representing Sonoco, a global leader in paper packaging, in the sale of the equity interests in two WFOEs in China, providing full-scope legal services including pre-transaction consultation, drafting and negotiation of transaction documents, closing matters and government communications; leading the liquidation and deregistration of related joint ventures, distribution of remaining assets and cross-border remittance, bank account deregistration and remote witnessing, assisting the client in completing the full “transaction-exit”
• Acting as PRC counsel to Ferguson, a North American industrial manufacturing and distribution giant, in its acquisition of the FloWorks Group, conducting due diligence and issuing legal opinions on special issues including antitrust, foreign investment security review, export controls and tax disclosure (Bulletin 7) with respect to its China business, and coordinating with foreign counsel to advance the transaction and closing.
• Representing Enapter, a European new energy company, in establishing a foreign-invested enterprise jointly with a Chinese listed company, providing legal services including drafting transaction documents, negotiations and company formation.
• Representing Moore Threads, a leading Chinese GPU chip company, in reviewing IPO strategic placement agreements and strategic cooperation agreements, and researching special issues including lending of restricted shares and interest on subscription funds.
• Providing due diligence and transaction document drafting services for JOY, a global leader in mining equipment manufacturing, in the sale of its domestic equity interests.
• Providing due diligence and pharmaceutical compliance review services for a well-known pharmaceutical company in its acquisition of a domestic company's equity interests.