Corporate law is about more than just transactions - in essence, it's about building value. Our team has tons of experience guiding clients through high-stakes deals, from startup funding and venture capital raises to mergers and acquisitions, public market transactions (IPOs, rights issues, takeovers and schemes), and strategic partnerships.

With our experience representing Australian companies, multinationals and innovative high-growth start-ups and scale-ups, we know how to cut through complexity. We'll help you navigate every deal structure, governance issue, due diligence questions and transaction document, skipping over every hidden trap you might not see but we definitely will.

We also give you a fixed price which is actually fixed, not an estimate with loads of carve-outs. Low stress, cost certainty and a memorable post-transaction celebration – it's the complete package deal.

Commercial law is about the day-to-day operational legal needs of a corporate client. It's the core of your business, and servicing it happens to be the core of ours.

Our clients range from mega multinationals to tiny start-ups, covering diverse sectors such as energy or entertainment, fashion or food, manufacturing or media...we promise our legal skills are more sophisticated than our categorisations by alliteration. Some clients have inhouse legal teams, and we act as an extension of their team. Others use us as their inhouse lawyers. We look after a large proportion of our clients on a retainer basis – we unashamedly love this, because it frees us and them up to focus our attention on learning the business and becoming integrated as part of the commercial process.

What does day to day mean? It means drafting, reviewing and negotiating a billion contracts of infinite variety; setting you up with a manageable, plain language set of standard contracts that are best of breed and are tailored to your commercial risk profile; advising on the legal aspects of big and small commercial decisions; ensuring you comply with all the laws and regulations that govern your business; and pointing out and helping you manage your legal risks well before they bite you.

Our commercial team is fast, responsive, pragmatic and delightful. You'll wonder how you survived before you met them.

The most important non-human asset any business possesses is its IP. Many businesses still don't give it the attention it deserves, to their eventual regret.

One reason for this is the confusion around what intellectual property actually is, how it's created and how it can be protected.

That's where we come in. You don't really need a detailed knowledge of the difference between trade marks and designs, how long copyright exists and whether or not you should be getting your invention patented. You do need to be thinking, as early as possible, about what IP you might be creating, who owns it, how you can control and exploit it and what you can do to prevent it from being swiped.

This can get very complicated, and things aren't always as they might seem in the world of IP. Registering trade marks and designs, grabbing domain names, asserting ownership of copyright, assigning or licensing rights of use and exploitation, distribution agreements, parallel importation, counterfeiting, brand protection – all these can raise critical issues in the life of a business.

We manage a bunch of trade mark portfolios in Australia and internationally; conduct search and seizure raids for manufacturers whose products are being pirated by counterfeit imports; advise on brand sponsorships, licence agreements and IP protection strategies; and litigate infringement cases including large scale claims on behalf of movie rights holders against file sharing network users.

We litigate, arbitrate and mediate everywhere from the High Court to the littlest tribunal, in NSW, interstate and overseas.

Nobody but a crazy person litigates for fun. Disputes are an inevitable part of doing business, but they're distracting, unproductive and very expensive. Much like going to the dentist.

So how, you may ask, can we make this experience anything but awful? Well, we start by recognising that the focus of dispute resolution should be on the resolution, not the dispute. Many litigators just want to litigate; switch them on, point them at the nearest court, and prepare for monthly invoices that will make your eyes water. We see litigation as absolutely the last resort, not a process by which you pay for our entertainment.

Our team is extremely deep in experience. There simply isn't a court, tribunal or type of fight in which we haven't been before. We know how the system works and how to use it to your best advantage.

We come in as soon as you smell trouble. You get clear, concise advice on where you stand; we'll engage direct negotiations, mediation or any other alternative dispute resolution method we think might resolve the dispute; if arbitration is the go, we are all over that; if there are cross-border complications, we have guru expertise for that; if litigation has to be, then we have the firepower to take on the fight.

And here's the kicker: every other law firm will tell you that fixing fees for litigation is impossible. We do it all the time, and it works just fine. The secret, if you must know, is that we're focused on your problem, not our timesheets.

We get it, this is the most frustrating area of law for every employer. It's complex and broad. Modern awards, enterprise agreements, unfair dismissals, workplace investigations and health and safety obligations are just the beginning. But the worse thing is that, even if you’re the world’s fairest employer, sooner or later you'll be dealing with employment disputes. And then you're looking at spending money you shouldn't have to spend, either on lawyers or a pay-out. It's frequently unfair, but the practical reality is that it's rarely worth the fight.

We can help you take back control of this part of your business risk. We look after employment law needs on a retainer model, which includes litigation. That means you’ve got advice on tap before, during and after workplace issues turn into disputes. Further, your downside risk is covered, so you can handle disputes in accordance with what's right, not just to make the problem go away.

Our points of difference are two: first, we give you short answers to complex questions - let us worry about the legal “what if’s”, you just take care of your staff. Secondly, we've thought about the problem of open-ended risk in managing a workforce, and aligned our service model to solve it. The result is money not just saved, but better spent.

All businesses will collide with the Competition & Consumer Act at some point, and it's not something you want to navigate without an experienced pilot.

Our team is all over heavily regulated industries and the intricate webs of the Australian regulatory scene. There's the sheer weight of the CCA and ACCC for one thing, then there are the eight-jurisdiction complexities of state and territory-based regulation that makes life in many economic sectors so, um, interesting.

Whatever regulatory regime you're contending with - or trying to work out whether it's one you have to worry about at all - we have the experience and log-ins to speed you through the mess.

This part of our practice is anything but an add-on or a giving back. It is central to our purpose and strategy, because we’re not really lawyers if we’re not working to make the law do better for society.

Lawyers are uniquely placed to use the law for good. We apply the full set of our skills, experience, position and passions to that end.

We are involved in disparate aspects of public law and human rights, including work for sexual assault survivors, refugees, civil activists, and in areas such as environmental justice, anti-discrimination and equality, freedom of speech and association and animal rights.

We have been involved in some of the leading human rights cases in Australia, pushing the law to its maximum potential as an agent of progress.

Some of our cases:

• Faruqi v Hanson
• Jayson Gillham v Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
• Khaled Sabsabi v Australian Research Council
• Toltz v Riemer; Toltz v Keane
• Tarnawsky v Commonwealth
• Azimitabar v Commonwealth
  

Marque’s energy and infrastructure projects team specialises in advising clients on world class projects in a range of sectors, including renewable energy, mining, ports and terminals and social infrastructure. Clients count on our team to counsel them on the technical, commercial and geopolitical challenges unique to their projects. We advise clients on the legal issues which they face from creation to acquisition of projects, large or small. We have experience in negotiating dense and complex agreements in the aviation, water, roads, ports and rail sectors, as well as clean energy-related infrastructure projects. Our team has unique experience, acting as outsourced in house counsel for many clients and dealing directly with the business. We become part of our client’s team and we invest significantly in the relationship. We give advice that is both sound in law and works in the real world.

We have deep experience representing consumer-facing businesses of all kinds, including FMCG, fashion, food, company-owned or franchised.

We look after day-to-day contracting needs, marketing and advertising, sales channel control, IP protection, as well as all the regulatory woes like privacy, SPAM, consumer complaints and product safety.

In this sector, the keys to good legal support are speed, responsiveness and pragmatic commerciality. We get it: no long advices, just answers.

Our practice in the world of tech and content is constantly burgeoning, like AI but actually reliable and socially useful.

We look after artists, musicians, all kinds of creative types, as well as licence holders, producers and the engine rooms of online development.

We do hardware, software, apps, cloud, data services, content licensing, cyber security and all the buzzwords.

We cover pre-publication review for defamation and other legal risks, IP protection and enforcement.

This stuff is as cool as it sounds, and we love it.

We look after all aspects of getting a charity up and running, including structuring advice, drafting policies, incorporation and registration with the ACNC, and seeking Deductible Gift Recipient endorsement from the ATO.

We then take care of governance and compliance needs, including with charities laws and electoral laws.

We can help you get the relevant permits for public fundraising or set up auspicing agreements for you. Just like any other organisation that carries out commercial activities, we can also assist you with services agreements, NDAs, employment and contractor agreements, website terms of use and privacy policies.