Director

CORPORATE AND FINANCE

About Kenneth

Previously with one of the largest law firms in Singapore, Kenneth joins Drew & Napier bringing with him over 10 years of significant experience in private equity, mergers and acquisitions, REITs and business trusts.

Experience

His recent transactions include the CapitaRetail China Development Fund II and the CapitaRetail India Development Fund (combined fund size of over S$1.8 billion) by CapitaLand Limited, representing an investor in the Ascott Serviced Residence (China) Fund, which closed with capital commitments of US$500 million, and the Mapletree India-China (MIC) Fund, a dual-country total return fund with commitments of over US$600 million. In the course of his work, Kenneth has also represented a sovereign fund in its investment activities.

In addition, REITS are an area in which Kenneth has considerable experience, having been involved in the initial public offering of Ascendas India Trust, Singapore's first listed Indian property trust, and the proposed initial public offering of APL Japan Trust. Kenneth also advised Suntec REIT and K-REIT Asia in their respective acquisitions of a one-third interest each in One Raffles Quay, with a combined deal size of over S$1.8 billion.

Aside from trust and funds experience, Kenneth has led projects involving cross-border mergers and acquisitions of public listed as well as early-stage businesses in the technology, manufacturing, education and other sectors, with target companies located in the United States, Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia and China, amongst others. Kenneth’s other corporate, M&A experience includes advising on the sale of a phosphate-mineral mining venture by a consortium of Singaporean investors/venture capitalists to an ASX-listed purchaser; advising one of the world’s largest global telecommunications groups on a proposed takeover of a Singapore listed company; advising on the acquisition and restructuring of a leading education provider and the acquisition of a well established food distribution business, both operating in Malaysia.

He was part of a project team involved in the proposed public listing of a leading regional entertainment service provider and a lifestyle-furniture company.

Given his keen interest in technology law, Kenneth also has experience in the high tech and telecommunications industry. Kenneth has advised numerous internet companies, systems integrators and software developers on structuring, licensing and other issues. He has been named in AsiaLaw Leading Lawyers as one of Asia’s leading Information Technology lawyers. His portfolio of clients includes USlisted semiconductor contract manufacturers to large regional hard disk distributors, OEM hardware manufacturers, as well as local software companies. Kenneth conceptualised and developed an Intellectual Property management audit program for the Infocommunications Development Authority of Singapore. In connection with that, he conducted an IP pre-audit program on one of Singapore’s largest systems integrators, as well as Singapore’s leading banking and financial back-room software developer.

Kenneth has previously served as general counsel at Ecquaria Technologies (a leading e-government software developer funded by a joint venture investment fund established by Standard Chartered Bank & MMI Holdings Ltd). His responsibilities included overseeing all legal aspects of the company and its operations as well as managing its intellectual property rights; advising on shareholders agreements, investor rights agreements,and structuring and reviewing software and services partnership programs involving Ecquaria Technologies and its business partners, which include Oracle Inc, IBM, Hewlett Packard and Sun Microsystems Inc.

Appointments / Memberships

• Member of the Law Society of Singapore
• Member of the Singapore Academy of Law