DDD Foundation: Dialogue for Democracy and Development

Biography

Bruno Leroy is the Founding Partner of Leroy și Asociații, an independent business law firm based in Bucharest, and a member of the Paris and Bucharest Bar Associations. A French lawyer who has practised in Romania since 1998, he advises international investors on mergers and acquisitions, real estate transactions, competition and European law, energy and foreign investment matters, and has acted on some of the most significant projects in the Romanian market over the past two and a half decades.

He began his career in Paris in 1994 with the international law firm Gide Loyrette Nouel, and in 1998 relocated to Bucharest to head the firm's Romanian office as it expanded its presence in South East Europe. Named Partner in 2004, he led the Romanian Gide team until 2014, advising European groups on the privatisation of Romanian state-owned companies, capital market transactions and corporate restructurings during a period of rapid transformation of the country's economy.

In February 2014, together with his partner Andreea Toma, he took over Gide's Bucharest office and created Leroy și Asociații, which has since grown into a full-service firm acting for clients from France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, Turkey and the United States. His work includes advising the French dairy group Lactalis on the acquisition of Albalact, one of Romania's largest dairy producers, in one of the first significant voluntary takeover bids carried out on the Bucharest Stock Exchange, as well as advising Groupe Rocher on its acquisitions in Romania and energy groups active in the Romanian gas and power markets.

Bruno Leroy holds a Master's degree in International Business Law from ESCP in Paris and law degrees from the University of Paris V. He is a member of the International Bar Association, a longstanding member of the Foreign Investors Council in Romania, where he co-chaired the Public Institutions Management task force, and a member of Aspen Institute Romania. He has served as president of the Romanian section of the French Foreign Trade Advisors and spent several years leading the Lycée Français project in Bucharest. He works in French, English and Romanian.