Sarah Grimmer is Secretary-General of Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre. She was formerly Senior Legal Counsel at the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) where she acted as registrar in several inter-State arbitrations under the Law of the Sea Convention and served as tribunal secretary in multiple investment treaty arbitrations and contract-based claims.

Prior to joining the PCA, Sarah served as Assistant Counsel at the ICC International Court of Arbitration in Paris. She was also a member of the international arbitration group at Shearman & Sterling LLP in Paris, prior to which she worked in private practice in Auckland. In 2015, Sarah was appointed to the Special Tribunal for Lebanon Disciplinary Board. She is a member of the ICCA-ASIL Task Force on Damages (2016), ICCA Publications Committee (2015), the IBA Investment Arbitration Subcommittee (2014), New Zealand ICC Arbitration Committee (2014), and the IBA Arb40 Steering Committee (2013).

Brenda Horrigan is an internationally recognised arbitration practitioner with nearly 30 years of extensive global experience, having worked from the US, Paris, Moscow, Shanghai, Sydney and now Singapore.

Prior to establishing her own practice in 2021, Brenda was the Head of International Arbitration in Australia at Herbert Smith Freehills’ Sydney office. She commenced her career as a transactional lawyer and has spent nearly 20 years focussing exclusively on complex international commercial and investment treaty arbitration matters at both the arbitration and enforcement stages.

Brenda is the immediate past president of the Australian Centre for International Commercial Arbitration (ACICA) and remains a member of its Executive. She is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators and is listed on the panels of numerous arbitral institutions.

Neil Kaplan CBE QC SBS has been a full-time practising arbitrator since 1995. During this period, he has been involved in several hundred arbitrations as co-arbitrator, sole arbitrator or chairman. These arbitrations have included a wide range of commercial, infrastructure and investment disputes, under the auspices of the ICC, HKIAC, LCIA, PCA, SIAC, SCC, ICSID and CIETAC. Mr Kaplan’s investment treaty cases under ICSID and UNCITRAL both as presiding arbitrator and coarbitrator have involved Timor-Leste, Hungary, Croatia, Vietnam, Indonesia, Cambodia, Ecuador, Iran, India, Ukraine, Russia, Korea and Saudi Arabia.

Called to the Bar of England and Wales in 1965, Mr Kaplan has practiced as a barrister, Principal Crown Counsel at the Hong Kong Attorney General’s Chambers, and served as a Judge of the Supreme Court of Hong Kong in charge of the Construction and Arbitration List. He has been a Queen’s Counsel since 1982 and was a founder and first head of Des Voeux Chambers in Hong Kong. In March 2022, Mr Kaplan was sworn in as a member of the Supreme Court of Bahrain.

As Deputy Secretary-General of HKIAC, Joe oversees some arbitration and mediation proceedings under HKIAC’s auspices, develops rules and procedures of HKIAC, and promotes HKIAC’s dispute resolution services worldwide. He has acted as secretary to multiple tribunals in HKIAC-administered cases. Joe was a member of the HKIAC Rules Revision Committee responsible for drafting the 2018 and 2013 HKIAC Administered Arbitration Rules. He also serves as Secretary to HKIAC’s Nominations Committee. He is a key contributor to Moser & Bao, A Guide to the HKIAC Arbitration Rules – a detailed commentary to the 2013 HKIAC Administered Arbitration Rules, published by Oxford University Press.

Before joining HKIAC, Joe worked as a registered foreign lawyer at a leading international law firm in Hong Kong, acting in numerous international arbitrations under the HKIAC, UNCITRAL, ICC, LCIA and ICSID Rules. Before he moved into private practice, Joe worked as Assistant Counsel at the Singapore International Arbitration Centre and interned at the Permanent Court of Arbitration and the High Court of Hong Kong.

Christopher practices as a full time independent arbitrator from 4 Pump Court in London and from his office in Hong Kong where he is a member of Pump Court International. Christopher is appointed in a wide range of international commercial disputes and has considerable experience of arbitrations involving Chinese and East Asian parties and the law of the PRC, built up over the past two decades.

Christopher is a panel member at HKIAC, SIAC, KCAB (International), CIETAC, and AIAC and is is frequently appointed in complex arbitrations seated in Hong Kong, Singapore, Seoul, Switzerland, Stockholm and London.

Listed in the 2021 Directories in Band 1 and a member of the ‘Hall of Fame’ he is described as having “a fine legal mind, very pragmatic approach to arbitration procedure” and to be “highly experienced in commercial arbitration”.

He has extensive experience of remote hearings involving parties, counsel, and arbitrators in different continents, oral testimony with interpreters, live transcript, and live documents.

Eric is Managing Counsel at the HKIAC. Prior to joining the HKIAC, Eric worked for five years as a barrister-at-law in Hong Kong focusing primarily on international commercial and construction arbitrations, as well as general commercial litigation in Hong Kong, and has worked as counsel as well as tribunal secretary in several major international commercial, construction, and financial arbitrations seated around the world.

In addition to his work as a barrister, Eric was previously Adjunct Professor at the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing, lecturing in advocacy and investor-state arbitration. Eric has also published on issues of international dispute resolution and investor-state arbitration.

Eric holds a BCL from Oxford University, PCLL and JD from City University from Hong Kong, MSc E-commerce from the University of Hong Kong, as well as a BS in Business Administration and Information Systems from Babson College in the USA. He is admitted to practice law in Hong Kong.

Anselmo Reyes practises as an arbitrator. He was Professor of Legal Practice at Hong Kong University from October 2012 to September 2018. Before that, he was a judge of the Hong Kong High Court from September 2003 to September 2012, when he was in charge of the Construction and Arbitration List (2004-8) and the Commercial and Admiralty Lists (2008-12). He was Representative of the Hague Conference on Private International Law's Regional Office Asia Pacific from April 2013 to July 2017. He became an International Judge of the Singapore International Commercial Court in January 2015.

Huawei Sun specializes in international commercial and investment treaty arbitration and has represented Chinese and foreign clients in cases conducted under HKIAC, CIETAC, ICC, UNCITRAL, LCIA, SIAC and ICSID arbitration rules. She has significant experience working as counsel and arbitrator on disputes involving international sale of goods, cross-border M&A, energy and resources projects, financial products, intellectual property, and construction projects, with governing laws including English law, Hong Kong law, Singaporean law, French law, Swiss law, Dutch law, Malaysian law and Chinese law.

Huawei has extensive experience arguing China-related cases before international tribunals. She conducts advocacy in English either by herself or in collaboration with barristers.

Prior to Zhong Lun, Huawei worked for more than seven years at the Beijing and Hong Kong offices of a leading international law firm, where she was later responsible for managing the firm’s China-related arbitration matters.

Winnie Tam SBS, SC, JP practices from Des Voeux Chambers in Hong Kong as a barrister-advocate, independent arbitrator and mediator in civil and commercial law with an emphasis on intellectual property. She was also admitted to practise as a barrister in England and Wales, and as an advocate and solicitor in Singapore and the Australian Capital Territory. Winnie was awarded the title of Senior Counsel by the Chief Justice of HKSAR in 2006. She served as the Chairman of the Hong Kong Bar Association between January 2015 to January 2017, and currently as the Chairman of the Committee on Intellectual Property. In her capacity as a Deputy High Court Judge and then Recorder, she has adjudicated on a wide range of civil and commercial matters.

Based in Paris, Peter Thorp has substantial experience in conducting arbitrations in Asia and Europe under the rules of all of the major international arbitration institutions. He has acted as Chairman, Sole Arbitrator and Co-Arbitrator on a large number of ICC, LCIA, SCC, CIETAC, HKIAC, SIAC and CAA (Taiwan) arbitrations, as well as ad hoc arbitrations under the UNCITRAL Rules. He is on the panel of numerous arbitration institutions, and is regularly selected by those institutions, such as the ICC and HKIAC, for appointments as arbitrator.

Peter has also frequently acted as emergency arbitrator and as sole arbitrator in expedited and fast-track arbitrations.

Peter is fluent in French and Chinese. Peter’s experience as arbitrator spans a broad range of sectors, including joint venture and M&A, shareholder disputes, IP and licensing, construction and infrastructure, media and telecoms, banking & finance, insurance, energy, oil & gas and mining, sale of goods, and pharmaceuticals/biotechnology.

Dr Ling Yang is Deputy Secretary-General of HKIAC and Chief Representative of the Shanghai Office.

Prior to joining HKIAC, Ling was an Associate Professor at the East China University of Political Science and Law where she taught international arbitration for nine years. During 2017, Ling was a visiting scholar at Boston University School of Law. Ling has published widely on issues of international dispute resolution and arbitration in China, and currently serves as Executive Editor-in-Chief for the Shanghai International Arbitration Review. Ling has also been appointed as arbitrator. She obtained a PhD in 2009 and an LLM in International Law in 2006 from Wuhan University. In 2008, she was visiting scholar at the University of Aix-en-Provence Marseille III.