International by vocation

In the 1920s and 1930s the founders of JeantetAssociés were pioneers in the new and fast expanding legal practice of international business law. Pierre Lepaulle was the first French lawyer to be awarded a Scientae Juridiae Doctoris from Harvard (1922). With Lepaulle, Fernand-Charles Jeantet developed a passion for all aspects of business law, becoming particularly distinguished in the area of competition law. He was one of the authors of the Decree of 30 June 1945 on market prices, the seminal text on economic and competition law in France.

With the arrival of the Marshall Plan after the Second World War, the firm became the preferred counsel for American companies wanting to set up in France and in Europe, such as Coca-Cola, Kodak, Otis, Monsanto, etc. These American clients have remained with the firm over the years. In addition, the firm’s partners actively contributed to the drafting of European community law. In France, they also took part in the wave of privatisations: Renault, Thomson, Rhône-Poulenc when it merged with Sanofi, and fully contributed to the creation of a network of European law firms, the Alliance of European Lawyers, today disbanded.

At the end of the 1990s, the legal profession went through a difficult transformation, in particular with the massive arrival of Anglo-Saxon firms. JeantetAssociés took the bet of maintaining its independence while keeping its eye firmly on the international market. Within a few years, the firm extended its presence to fast-developing countries: Latin America, China (a Chinese desk opened in Paris), India, Africa and the Middle East. It also reinforced its links with other independent firms in the United States and Europe and opened a new office in Casablanca in 2009.