Pascal Pichonnaz is currently full professor (since 2000) for Swiss contract law, Roman law, as well as European consumer law and comparative contract law at the Faculty of Law of the University of Fribourg. He was Dean of the Faculty of Law from 2014–2017. He has been President of the Department of Private Law and vice-president and president of the IBL. He is one of the cofounder of the LLM Programme at the Faculty of Law (MLCBP).

He has published several books, and more than 150 articles, on fundamental aspects of Swiss contract law (including AI and the Law), on Comparative Contract Law, on Set-off and Arbitration, as well as on Roman law, unfair competition and family law. Pichonnaz is also a member of several boards of legal periodicals.

He is a standing member of the Jury of the Premio internazionale di diritto romano Gérard Boulvert and is active as an international commercial arbitrator (ICC, Swiss Rules-SCAI, ad hoc), as well as arbitrator in sport (CAS). He has been member of the board and then president in 2008–2009 of the European Law Faculties Association (ELFA). Since 2018, he has been a member of the Council of the European Law Institute, its vice-president from 2019-2021, and its president from 2021-2023 and 2023-2025. More on www.unifr.ch/ius/pichonnaz

Marco Bassini is an Assistant Professor of Fundamental Rights and Artificial Intelligence at the Tilburg Institute for Law, Technology, and Society (TILT), Tilburg University. He teaches, among other courses, Regulation and Governance of AI in the Law and Technology master’s program and Law, Technology, and Society in the Global Law bachelor program. He is also the Principal Investigator of the Dutch-government funded research grant “RetrAIn – Enforcing Constitutional Rights in the Age of Generative Artificial Intelligence” and one of the experts selected by the European AI Office for the drawing-up of the General Purpose AI Code of Practice. He previously served as Adjunct Professor of Constitutional Law and Internet Law at Bocconi University, where he was also the Coordinator of the LLM in Law of Internet Technology from 2020 to 2023. He obtained his PhD in Constitutional Law and European Law from the University of Verona in 2016. A qualified lawyer with the Bar of Milan (Italy) since 2013, Dr. Bassini has over a decade of experience combining academic research with legal practice. He has worked as data protection counsel at international law firms in Milan and Rome, and served as Data Protection Officer for a leading Italian company. In addition, he has advised the Italian Communications Authority and the Italian Ministry for Technological Innovation. His expertise spans data protection law, AI regulation, and media law.

Daniel Kraus is a professor, attorney (www.patentattorneys.ch/en  and www.vialex.ch) , and deputy judge at the Swiss Federal Patent Court with over three decades of experience in intellectual property, technology, and innovation law. A graduate of the University of Geneva and King’s College London, he earned the Walther Hug Prize for his doctoral thesis on parallel imports of patented products.

Before joining academia, he held senior roles at the Swiss Federal Institute of Intellectual Property, leading international affairs and technical cooperation. His expertise spans IP, software law, and AI law, advising on copyright, licensing, open-source compliance, and emerging regulatory frameworks for artificial intelligence.

Daniel is co-author of leading works on blockchain law, trademark, patent, and copyright law, and is a frequent speaker at international conferences. In 2025, Managing IP named him an IP Star in recognition of his contributions to the field.

Outside his legal work, he enjoys composing music, outdoor sports, and social-entrepreneurship projects.

Pascale Schwerzmann
Legal Tech Lead & Sr Technical Specialist

Karim Tejani
Head Legal Switzerland

Thomas Spörri
Regional Counsel EMEA at Global Deal Team

and others.

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Erdem Büyüksagis is an internationally recognized expert in contract law, commercial law and tort law. Professor Büyüksagis is lecturing at Fribourg University in Switzerland. Some of his works were cited by the Swiss Federal Court. In addition to his academic activities, He regularly acts as an arbitrator under the ICC Rules, Swiss Rules, or in ad hoc panels. Professor Büyüksagis holds both Swiss and Turkish citizenship and is a Member of the Swiss Arbitration Association (ASA) and the ICC Turkey.

Some of his publications are:

• Duncan Fairgrieve/Christoph Busch/Erdem Büyüksagis et al., Product Liability and Online Marketplaces: Comparison and Reform, ICLQ 2/2024, pp. 477-504.
• Liability of E-Commerce Platforms for Third-Party Defective Products, in: Eva Maria Belser, Pascal Pichonnaz, Hubert Stöckli (Eds.), Le droit sans frontières - Recht ohne Grenzen - Law without Borders, Mélanges pour Franz Werro, Bern 2022, pp. 127-141.
• The Bounds between Negligence and Strict Liability, in: Mauro Bussani & Anthony J. Sebok (Eds.), Global Tort Law, Edward Elgar Publishing – 2nd ed. Cheltenham 2021, Chapter 10 (with Franz Werro).
• Towards a Transatlantic Concept of Data Privacy, 30 Fordham Intell. Prop. Media & Ent. L.J. 2019, pp. 139-221.

What Europeans Can Learn from an Untold Story of Transjudicial Communication: The Swiss-Turkish Experience, in: Mads Andenas & Duncan Fairgrieve (Eds.), Courts and Comparative Law, Oxford University Press - Oxford 2015, Chapter 37.

Rick Magnan currently serves as the General Counsel, Chief Information Officer, and Chief of Cyber Security for Rising Tide. During his career as a lawyer and computer scientist, he has served in diverse positions in both career fields in private industry, international organizations, and government. He teaches courses involving law and technology, including cyber security, artificial intelligence, and blockchain.

He holds a B.S. in Mathematics and Computer Science from the University of New Hampshire, a M.S. in Computer Systems from the U.S. Air Force Institute of Technology, a J.D. with honors from Georgetown University, and a LL.M. from the University of Fribourg, Switzerland."

Trevor J. Purdie is an experienced mother tongue English speaking attorney-at-law practicing in Switzerland. He advises a primarily corporate clientele in both English and French in all of the traditional aspects of business law, apart from tax (Trade, Corporate and Contract Law, M&A transactions, Investment Agreements, Labour law and Intellectual Property). In 2022, he earned the title of Certified Specialist SBA in labour law after completing a challenging, practice-oriented training, in which he strengthened his skills in employment law.

His over 20 years of experience include merger deals and share purchase transactions, including due diligence, negotiation, hands-on experience in mass dismissals assisting numerous international companies, corporate liquidation and international arbitration. Due to his experience, in particular in IP protection and company financing, and the fact that he is quite knowledgeable of new technologies, he is also a trusted partner to many successful start-up businesses in Switzerland.

Melina Llodrá has 20 years of experience in international business law, including negotiation and drafting of cross-border M&As and JVs. She assists in complex compliance projects, focusing on internal investigations, implementation and management of compliance programs and best practice risk and compliance management. She worked for +10 years as counsel at LALIVE (Geneva, Switzerland) and as senior counsel at McKinsey for Latam.

She is an Argentinean lawyer, LL.M. University of Illinois (US), certified Compliance and Ethics Professional - International (CCEP-I) and certified expert on auditing ISO 37001. She is a member of the International Bar Association (officer of Compliance committee), Society of Corporate, Compliance and Ethics (SCCE), Rosario Bar Association (Argentina) and Swiss Argentine Chamber of Commerce (Compliance Committee). She is also a lecturer at the Fribourg University School of Law, Master of Laws (LL.M.) in Cross-Cultural Business Practice and speaker at international conferences on anticorruption and international contracts.

Dr. Christian Kunz co-heads Bär & Karrer's Data Protection & Digital Economy as well as Technology, Media & Telecommunications (TMT) practice groups.

He is an expert in the field of data, data protection, cybersecurity and technology law.

He advises Swiss and international clients on data, data protection, cybersecurity and technology law matters, including cybercrime issues, the development and implementation of data strategies and data protection-related processes, the use and monetisation of data, (cloud) outsourcings of data, international data transfers and data disclosure requests (e.g., based on MLAT requests or the U.S. Cloud Act), and data breach incident management and response.

He also advises on data-driven business models and platform solutions (XaaS, cloud services, IoT, online platforms, digital marketplaces), advanced technology projects (AI, Machine Learning, Big Data, blockchain / distributed ledger technology (DLT), etc.), digital infrastructure and technology transactions, and other complex Swiss and European data protection, cybersecurity and technology law issues. Besides that, Christian conducts large-scale internal investigations and e-discovery projects.

He is KnowledgeNet Chapter Chair of the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) in Switzerland. He regularly gives lectures, participates in panel discussions, publishes scientific articles and newsletters and holds internal and external trainings in his areas of expertise. He is an author in the "Basler Kommentar zum Datenschutzgesetz" and in the "Orell Füssli Kommentar zum Datenschutzgesetz", leading commentaries on the revised Swiss Federal Data Protection Act. And he is a lecturer for the CAS Data Protection course at the University of Zurich.

Christian is listed in Chambers Europe 2024 as "Up and Coming” for TMT, with reference to a client who says that "Christian's knowledge and expertise are exceptional, coupled with a witty and insightful approach to complex issues". Legal 500 EMEA ranks him as Next Generation Partner for TMT in 2024 and recommends him for data privacy and data protection advice since 2023. At the IFLR Rising Stars Awards EMEA 2022, he was recognized as Rising Star in the field of data protection & data security. And Leaders League has rated him as excellent for data protection as well as IT and outsourcing advice in Switzerland since 2022.

Geraint Howells is the Executive Dean for Business, Public Policy and Law at NUI Galway. Previously he was Professor of Commercial Law and Associate Dean in Humanities for Internationalisation at Manchester University, where he remains a visiting professor. He has been Dean of Law at the City University of Hong Kong and Head of the Law Schools in Manchester and Lancaster.

He was called to the bar in 2002 through a special route for distinguished academics and was awarded an LLD in 2014. He has published extensively on consumer law, product liability and European private law and was a member of the Acquis group developing common principles of European contract law and tort law. A former President of the International Association of Consumer Law, he edited the Consumer Law Journal for many years, is on the editorial board of the Journal of Consumer Policy and European Review of Private Law and is a Series Editor for Routledge’s Markets and Law series. He has undertaken extensive consultancy for the government, the EU and NGOs.