Winning Strategies for Re-Negotiating or Terminating Commercial Contracts

Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer invites you to a roundtable event to discuss re-negotiating or terminating commercial contracts. Economic, political and technological change is all around us, and with it comes increased pressure to re-negotiate or end existing contractual arrangements that may no longer support the original objectives of one or other of the parties. For example:

• Brexit
  • What happens when contracts become uneconomical for suppliers to perform because of currency fluctuations or increased labour costs?
  • Or, when customer organisations want to downsize or escape existing commitments because the original business case has changed?
• Robotics and Increased Automation
  • And what about the emergence of robotics and cost savings associated with automation?  Could this affect existing, longer-term arrangements such as outsourcing contracts?
• Sub-Standard Performance
  • Termination scenarios can also arise where one party has simply failed to perform its obligations and the other decides to enforce its rights under the contract.

Winning Strategies 

• These scenarios can create conflict—for example, when one side wants an easy “out” but is blocked by demands for substantial compensation by the other or when there is a dispute over whether any sub-standard performance justifies termination. 
• We will work through a case study highlighting a selection of legal pitfalls to avoid when these situations arise and our top tips for achieving successful outcomes.

Topics:

• Grounds for termination
• Termination notices
• Preservation of rights
• Remediable breach
• Losing the right to terminate
• Generating leverage and protective correspondence
• Using ADR techniques to achieve successful outcomes
• Common mistakes

In addition to our London team, Maximilian Reichl from our Frankfurt office will be on hand to provide a German perspective and answer any questions from participants who may be considering German law and jurisdiction and termination issues arising in that context.