Swiss Arbitration

For quite some time international companies prefer to choose Swiss material Law to govern their international agreements for the following reasons:

• The Swiss Civil Code (including the Obligation Code) has been in force for more than 100 years without any major amendments and has been widely accepted and copied by other countries (for instance Turkey).
• The Swiss Civil Code is entirely codified – contrary to English Law where you must study all relevant precedents – and is very easy to understand. You can just refer to the applicable sections instead of producing long contractual Agreements (a Swiss Agreement usually requires not more than 10 pages instead of English/American Agreements - 50-100 pages)
• In case of a dispute it makes sense to use Swiss Arbitration Institutions and Swiss Arbitrators because they know the applicable Swiss Legal Provisions
• Therefore, the Swiss Chambers of Commerce have created a platform for dispute resolution using the co called “Swiss Rules”

In 2021, there have been some important changes that we would like to briefly inform you about.

Since the end of May 2021, the Swiss Chambers' Arbitration Institution (SCAI) is a Swiss public limited company called Swiss Arbitration Centre AG. The main shareholder is the Swiss Arbitration Association (ASA). The Board of Directors is composed of members from all over Switzerland. This is very significant from an organizational point of view and now represents a structure - encompassing the whole of Switzerland.

This new structure has been tasked to promote both the new trademark "Swiss Arbitration" and the notion of international arbitration in Switzerland. How does this new structure affect clauses where traditionally the parties declared the validity of the SCAI and named a Swiss Chamber of Commerce as the place of arbitration? Rest assured - it does not have a negative impact at all. Practically all existing arbitration clauses referring to the SCAI or the Chambers of Commerce remain valid and binding and are recognized and applied by the Swiss Arbitration Centre as the legal successor of the SCAI. Current arbitration proceedings will also continue to be administered by the Court of Arbitration of the Swiss Arbitration Centre.

If you, as a Russian partner, agree on an arbitration clause with foreign partners, you may choose Russian as the language of negotiations in the future; however, the proceedings will usually be conducted in English.

Revised Arbitration Rules

At the same time, revised international Swiss Arbitration Rules entered into force at the beginning of June 2021. These Arbitration Rules will speed up and simplify proceedings.