The annual FT Innovative Lawyers awards look for legal practitioners who shine in their particular fields. It is always instructive for the panel of judges to delve into the different ways they achieve this and the breadth of applications of their efforts. But whether their expertise concerns taxes, blockchain, or energy infrastructure, the common thread is that they have attempted something different that often promises to have profound impacts, beyond their firms.

The judges commended the efforts of these 10 practitioners in using their ingenuity to create breakthroughs. But it was the work of Bijal Ajinkya at Khaitan & Co that stood out in achieving a groundbreaking impact in a new area. After formalising the firm’s private client practice, she ended up helping India’s corporate dynasties on the tricky subject of succession planning.

As one judge noted: “She has developed a new practice area that should resonate across many Apac countries.”?

Profiles compiled by RSGI researchers and FT editors. “Winner” indicates an Innovative Lawyers 2025 award; the rest are in alphabetical order.

WINNER: Bijal Ajinkya
Partner, Khaitan & Co

If death and taxes are life’s two certainties, Bijal Ajinkya has built her career on solid foundations.

Over more than 20 years, she has worked on high-profile cases that shaped India’s approach to taxing domestic and foreign businesses. In 2013, Ajinkya joined Khaitan & Co and set up its formal private client practice, in part to help India’s corporate dynasties structure succession plans in events such as a business founder’s death.

The creation of this dedicated practice proved to be a shrewd move in a country with a fast-growing economy and a tradition of keeping business in the family. Mumbai-based Ajinkya has worked to raise awareness of the need for succession planning — a subject many client families were once reluctant to discuss — alongside asset protection and cross-border inheritance tax. The work requires, she says, a combination of technical skill and emotional intelligence.

Stella Cramer
Partner, Clifford Chance

Enabling investors and regulators to meet their responsibilities in deploying the power of artificial intelligence is a growing focus of Stella Cramer’s practice.

In the past year, the Singapore-based lawyer has helped two of Asia’s biggest investment funds define their policies on using and investing in AI — a task that involved juggling the funds’ appetite for risk, regulatory requirements in different jurisdictions, and judgments on how the technology is likely to evolve.

She joined the firm from Norton Rose Fulbright in 2023 to become head of Clifford Chance’s tech group in the Apac region.

Her experience includes advising Singapore’s digital and data protection watchdogs on AI regulation, and the city-state’s Ministry of Law on guidelines for AI in the legal sector.

Cramer is also closely involved with Clifford Chance’s own adoption of the technology.

Ben Hammond
Partner, Ashurst

The Hong Kong Monetary Authority, the territory’s de facto central bank, has been keen to test the potential of blockchain in improving the efficiency of capital markets, with several recent initiatives trying out the possibilities of digital bonds.

Ben Hammond, a specialist in distributed ledger technology, has been a central figure in bringing them to market, first through his work for investment bank Goldman Sachs and, more recently, for HSBC’s Orion digital platform.

The initiatives include the first government-issued tokenised green bond, offered by Hong Kong in 2023; its green multi-currency bond in 2024; and, later that year, the first digital bond from a private Hong Kong issuer, HSBC. Other companies have followed suit.

The use of blockchain for issuing bonds is in its infancy. But Hammond is confident that the faster transactions they enable will lead to more liquid bond markets.

Cheng Lim
Partner, King & Wood Mallesons

As a veteran of 35 years at the firm, Cheng Lim heads KWM’s telecoms, media, entertainment and technology sector for Australia.

As well as his work for clients, he also chairs the Chinese-Australian firm’s IT governance committee in his territory, helping to set its own digital strategy.

Cyber security is a particular specialism, an area in which Lim has been trying to raise corporate awareness of the risks for the past decade. When Australian businesses were hit by cyber attacks in 2022 and 2023 — first, health insurer Medibank, then consumer finance company Latitude — Lim and his colleagues were called in to help manage the immediate effects and aftermath of two of the largest and most significant data breaches in Australia to date.

Lim’s other leading clients include telecoms company Telstra, where he has advised on restructuring.

Tommy Liu
Partner, Hogan Lovells

Carmaker Geely, ride-hailing app Didi Chuxing, shopping platform Meituan: all are among the Chinese businesses making a mark in international markets. They are also among the roster of Tommy Liu’s clients.

The Hong Kong-based lawyer also advises western companies, such as SABMiller, HSBC and Chanel. But the greater part of his practice revolves around serving the growing roster of multinationals emerging from China, which also include China Telecom and Tencent.

Ensuring that cross-border data flows meet different countries’ regulatory requirements is a key focus, as is compliance with varying environmental, social and governance standards.

But Liu sees his remit as far broader. Modern practice has moved well beyond offering purely legal services, he says, and involves achieving a deep understanding of clients’ products and services while also offering strategic advice as they push overseas.

Takashi Nakazaki
Partner, Anderson Mori & Tomotsune

Japan is a country renowned for its technology, yet business appears cautious about use of generative artificial intelligence: research published last year showed that less than half of Japanese companies were using it, compared with more than 80 per cent in China and in the US.

If the country is now starting to move faster on generative AI, that is thanks in part to Takashi Nakazaki. As well as advising companies in this area, he has helped shape government policy by advising Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, which last year issued new guidelines on using AI in business.

He is also opening up Japan’s healthcare sector to greater use of the technology. Last August he joined SIP3, a government initiative that aims to balance privacy law on patient data with opening up medical histories to AI systems, potentially preparing the way for swifter, more accurate diagnoses.

Alex Roberts
Partner, Linklaters

Alex Roberts has more than a decade’s experience at Linklaters advising blue-chip clients on tech and digital laws across heavily-regulated sectors in China and other emerging markets in Asia.

Based in Shanghai since 2012, and appointed partner in 2023, he is now head of the firm’s technology, media and telecommunications and intellectual property team based in the city. As part of his role, he actively promotes the use of artificial intelligence tools to streamline legal services, working with client Microsoft and his own firm to accelerate their deployment.

Clients include multinational corporations such as drug group Novartis as well as Chinese companies.

His expertise in data regulation and cross-border dealmaking has come into sharper demand amid escalating economic tensions with the US, which has forced some clients to reconsider their presence in China.

Hemant Sahai
Founding partner, HSA Advocates

New Delhi-based lawyer Hemant Sahai has emerged as a “go to” figure for regulators across South Asia seeking to reform their energy systems and other infrastructure assets.

Most recently, he was hired to advise on an initiative backed by the IMF and then also supported by American development agency USAID to restructure Sri Lanka’s creaking grid system.

The result was Sri Lanka’s Electricity Act 2024, passed by the country’s previous parliament, which is aimed at improving the reliability and investability of the state’s power grid, although some details are now under review.

Sahai has helped to draft regulations for Indian states since liberalisation of the country’s power sector in the 1990s.

In 2003 he established his own firm, working across a country that has emerged as the third-largest consumer of power in the world.

Jaclyn Tsai
Co-founder, Lee, Tsai & Partners

From judge to government minister to crypto-law pioneer, Jaclyn Tsai has spent more than four decades building the regulatory frameworks that underpin Taiwan’s tech sector.

She began her career on the bench in Taiwan before joining IBM China as general counsel, where she found her niche in technology law. In 1998, she co-founded Lee, Tsai & Partners, a firm with a strong tech focus. Her reputation as a digital policy expert led to her 2013 ministerial appointment, where she helped steer Taiwan’s approach to digital affairs.

Now back in private practice, Tsai continues to shape Taiwan’s fast-evolving fintech and crypto landscape. She is chief adviser to the Taiwan Virtual Asset Service Provider Association, which negotiates with regulators and has drafted self-regulatory codes in the field.

Tsai also chairs the Asia FinTech Alliance, an industry body covering 10 countries.

Shaun Wu
Partner, Paul Hastings

As chair of his firm’s Hong Kong and China litigation department, and Asia head of investigations and white-collar defence, Shaun Wu has long experience of working with companies where things have gone wrong.

His clients include financial platforms, fintechs and, recently, a US/Asia-listed multinational.

But since 2024, Wu has sought to pre-empt such work by offering a new kind of service.

By helping clients to address systemic risks in their businesses, he wants, in effect, to put fires out before they start.

To do this, he secures board approval to deploy specialists such as forensic accountants and data analysts to monitor companies’ activities for danger signs.

This was once a labour-intensive task, he says, but can now be streamlined using artificial intelligence. When a potential future compliance breach has been identified, Wu advises on the steps needed to avert it.