Member Profiles

Chris Van Olmen is co-founder of the law firm Van Olmen & Wynant and head of the employment law practice. He is also co-founder and managing partner of L&E Global, an integrated alliance of premier employment law boutique firms. Chris covers all aspects of employment and industrial relations, including employment-related issues connected to reorganisation and restructuring processes, collective dismissals and closures and individual and collective employment disputes, including litigation for the Belgian Labour Courts. His clients include national and international companies and top executives. Chris is a reguar speaker or moderator at national and international seminars and conferences. His recent publications include: "International Labour and Employment Compliance Handbook" (Wolters Kluwer 2023);  the Belgian Chapter in "Employment Law Review” (Law Business Research 2023);  “The On Demand Economy”, Report of the IBA Global Employment Institute, 2019;  "Le lien de subordination à l’épreuve de l’ubérisation de l’économie ?", Wolters Kluwer / Chr. D.S. – Soc. Kron., 2016, 07. Chris is listed as a leading individual in The Legal 500 (2023), in Chambers Europe (2023) and named as "Employment Lawyer of the Year, Belgium" in Best Lawyers (2023). The Legal 500 includes Chris in its “Hall of Fame” (2023). Who's Who Legal mentions Chris as one of the 3 "Global Elite Thought Leader" of Belgium in their WWL Thought Leaders Labour & Employment (2023). Since 1999 he has been lecturing on social law in the traineeship programme organised by the Brussels Bar. He also served as a member of the Brussels Bar Council and is Board Member of the “Association for Social Law”. Chris Van Olmen is past Chair of the Employment and Industrial Relations Law Committee and past Chair of the Global Employment Institute of the IBA (International Bar Association). He currently is a member of the Advisory Board of the IBA GEI.  Chris is also a member of EELA (European Employment Lawyers Association) and of the American Bar Association (Labour and Employment Law Section).

Dirk HUYGENS (°1967) is a sworn Belgian lawyer, registered at the Antwerp bar, and founding partner of the Antwerp based business law firm CORBUS. Dirk mainly works in national and international business law, focusing on corporate law, mergers and acquisitions, restructuring and insolvency. He is also active in IP/ICT law. As certified mediator in civil and commercial matters and member of VOBA (www.voba.be) and the Brussels-based mediation centre b-Mediation, Dirk has acquired considerable experience as a commercial mediator. Dirk is regularly appointed as arbitrator in national and international arbitration cases, and he is a member of Cepina and arbitrator at the Arbitration Institute (www.euro-arbitration.org).

Specialized in personal injury, traffic law, occupational accidents, medical liability law, civil liability law and insurance.

KEGELS & Co - Advocaten is a Belgian law firm near by the port of Antwerp with decades of experience in commercial law and more specific in the niche of international trade, maritime and transport law. The practice areas of the office include (not limited) maritime law, transport law, (international) commercial law, customs law and banking and insurance law. Our lawyers write and speak Dutch, French, English and German. Our lawyers are members of several international organizations such as the International Bar Association (IBA), the Comité Maritime International (CMI) and the International Association of the Rhine Ships register (IVR). Younger members of the office are member of the International Association of Young Lawyers (AIJA) and the Young CMI.

Erik Gotfredsen is a Director, Senior Counsel and the Chief Executive Officer of Wakefield Quin Limited. Erik has been internationally recognized by Chambers Global and The Legal 500 as one of Bermuda’s leading corporate lawyers. Erik’s practice spans a broad range of sophisticated finance and capital market transactions with an emphasis on debt and equity offerings, banking and financial services, structured and project finance, secured lending, mergers and acquisitions and reorganizations. Erik has significant experience advising on joint ventures, partnerships, asset and fund management and regulatory compliance. In addition, Erik has an active general corporate practice, including advising on the establishment of companies in Bermuda, and is routinely instructed by a large number of leading international banks, financial institutions, public companies, private equity firms and onshore law firms. Before joining Wakefield Quin Limited in May 2014, Erik worked in the Corporate Department of Conyers Dill & Pearman Limited in Bermuda from 2008 to 2014.  Prior to arriving in Bermuda in 2008, Erik worked in the Real Estate Finance Group at Morrison & Foerster LLP in Tokyo, Japan and, before relocating to Tokyo, worked in the Corporate and Commercial Group at DLA Piper (Canada) LLP in Vancouver, Canada. Erik is admitted as a solicitor in British Columbia, England and Wales, Ontario and Bermuda and has received his B.Com. and LL.B from the University of Victoria, Canada and his LL.M. from Kyushu University, Japan after being awarded a prestigious Monbukagakusho Scholarship by the Japanese government to study in Japan. Erik is an active member of the Restructuring and Insolvency Specialists Association of Bermuda.