Written by- Thomas H. Curran, Thomas H. Curran Associates

How can businesses in your jurisdiction adopt AI and automation responsibly, and what guidance are you offering to ensure regulatory compliance?

Building on the successes of the first three conferences, the Insolvency Service held its "Forward Thinking" conference in April 2025. The organisers invited academics and practitioners to submit papers in advance. From the shortlist, the organisers selected a handful of the authors to present their papers at the conference.

The content of the papers, and the debate generated at the conference, will hopefully help the Insolvency Service in terms of selecting and crafting new legislative initiatives, going forward.

Highlights included:

Years after an insolvency proceeding is closed, can a solvent co-lessee/working interest participant (WIP) still be on the hook for their former partner’s share of unpaid Crown royalties? A recent Alberta Court of Appeal decision to allow an appeal in Spartan Delta Corp v Alberta (Energy and Minerals), 2025 ABCA 181 [Spartan Delta], raises concerns around whether the answer to such question can be 'yes'.

Under Turkish law, a joint-stock company’s liquidation follows its termination and ends with its deregistration. If the process is found incomplete—due to overlooked assets or ongoing disputes—supplementary liquidation allows temporary reinstatement of the company’s legal personality to finalize unresolved matters.

Introduction

Indonesia’s vibrant business landscape offers substantial opportunities. Nevertheless, there are certain aspects that creditors must be aware of to better protect their interests when local partners or debtors face financial distress. For foreign creditors and investors, understanding the legal mechanisms available when Indonesian counterparties become insolvent or financially unstable is essential.

Introduction

In our earlier blog, "EU insolvency law: Member States move closer to harmonisation", we examined how proposals to harmonise insolvency law across the European Union are gathering pace with a draft Directive to harmonise certain aspects of insolvency law being negotiated. And the pace is, indeed, continuing.

July 2025

Petrofac Restructuring Plans Overturned, but Significant Questions Left Unanswered

Key Takeaways

Provision of new money

In a significant follow-on judgment the Court of Appeal has both clarified and moved beyond the High Court’s approach to the ‘no worse off’ test, but ultimately set aside the sanction of Petrofac’s proposed restructuring plans on fairness grounds.

On 1 July, the Court of Appeal overturned the High Court’s decision1 to sanction the restructuring plans proposed by two Petrofac group companies as they did not consider that the benefits of the restructuring had been fairly allocated.