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Payne Hicks Beach successfully defended the music industry executive Merck Mercuriadis in a multimillion-pound High Court claim brought by his former company, Hipgnosis Music Ltd, which had gone into administration.
The liquidators alleged that he had breached his duties as a company director by developing the business of investing in music catalogues — which had been the basis of Hipgnosis Music Ltd — elsewhere after leaving. The court held that the concept did not belong to the company and that Mercuriadis was entitled to pursue it independently, in a judgment that provided clarity on directors’ duties and post-departure business opportunities under the Companies Act 2006.
In a case that could affect London’s reputation as the world’s “divorce capital”, the firm is acting for Vladimir Potanin, who opposes his former wife Natalia’s attempt to secure a further financial settlement in England after their 2014 divorce. Potanin argues that their finances have already been dealt with by the Russian courts.
