Can a Board director in a Vietnamese joint stock company be removed by the courts?

A Vietnamese court does not have clear authority to remove a Board director from the Board of a Vietnamese joint stock company like other more developed jurisdictions. Under Article 156.1 of the Enterprise Law 2014,  a Board director may be dismissed (miễn nhiệm) if he/she:

  • fails to maintain the qualifications of a Board director including not having full capacity for civil acts or belonging to the types of persons who are not allowed to manage an enterprise in Vietnam;   
  • fails to participate in activities of the Board for six consecutive months, except in the case of an event of force majeure; and
  • tenders a written resignation.
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Written by Nguyen Quang Vu On In ,

Corporate criminal liability in Vietnam – Entities subject to criminal liability

Under the Penal Code 2015, only “commercial legal person” (pháp nhân thương mại) could be subject to criminal liability. A commercial legal person is a legal person with the main objective of “seeking profit” which is distributed to its members. However, the concept of commercial legal person may raise several issues as follows:

  • The Criminal Proceedings Code 2015 only refers generally to “legal person”. It is not clear why the Criminal Proceedings Code 2015 does not use the term commercial legal person despite being drafted and passed at the same time as in the Penal Code 2015.
  • A commercial legal person’s main objective is “seeking profit” (tìm kiếm lợi nhuận). With the exception of “social enterprise” (doanh nghiệp xã hội), an enterprise in Vietnam is established for “the purpose of doing business” (mục đích kinh doanh). And “doing is business” has the purpose of “generating benefit” (sinh lợi). There is a slight difference between the use of words in the Enterprise Law 2014 and the Civil Code 2015. However, presumably, “generating benefit” under the Enterprise Law 2014 is intended to have the same meaning as “seeking profit” under the Civil Code 2015.
  • The Civil Code 2015 considers social enterprises to be non-commercial legal person. Under the Enterprise Law 2014, a social enterprise is set up to solve social or environment issues for public benefit. However, a social enterprise still has the objective of making profit and still distributes profit to its members as long as it retains at least 51% of its profit for its social purpose. In practice, a social enterprise can still commit the crimes which apply to other enterprises (e.g. polluting the environment or tax evasion). Therefore, in the author’s opinion, the classification of social enterprises being non-commercial legal person under the Civil Code 2015 is a mistake and social enterprises should still be subject to criminal liability under the Penal Code 2015.
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Written by Nguyen Quang Vu On In ,

Draft Decree on logistics services replacing Decree 140/2007 in Vietnam

A draft Decree on logistics services in Vietnam (Draft Logistics Decree) has been circulated by the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MOIT) recently. The Draft Logistics Decree, which appears to be a near final draft, will replace Decree 140/2007 on the same topic. The salient points of the Draft Logistics Decree include:

  • The Draft Logistics Decree classifies logistics services in accordance with Vietnam’s commitment to the WTO. On the other hand, Decree 140/2007 has its own classification of logistics services which are not consistent with the description of logistics services under the WTO Commitments. So it is not easier to compare the Draft Logistics Decree with the WTO Commitments;
  • The Draft Logistics Decree does not include certain logistics services which were provided in Decree 140/2007 (see the table below). Accordingly, it is not clear of these services are permitted or not permitted under the Draft Logistics Decree;
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Written by Nguyen Quang Vu On In ,

New Law on Technology Transfer in Vietnam

A new Law on Technology Transfer will take effect from 1 July 2018. The new Law on Technology Transfer reintroduces the requirement for registration of cross border transfer of technology which was abolished under the existing Law on Technology Transfer in 2006. The registration is the condition for a technology transfer contract to be valid. However, the new law does not impose any specific restriction on a technology contract like maximum contract period or cap on technology transfer royalty. Without these limitations, it is not clear on what basis the licensing authority would register or refuse to register a technology transfer contract.

This post in part is contributed by Nguyen Linh Chi, an intern at Venture North Law Limited.

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Written by Nguyen Quang Vu On In