Profile

Mr. Seppälä's main areas of practice are international commercial arbitration and international construction. He also has had substantial experience in commercial and financial matters generally, in common law, civil law and Islamic law jurisdictions.

Mr. Seppälä has thirty years of experience representing or counseling parties in relation to international commercial arbitrations under the rules of the International Chamber of Commerce, ICSID, the London Court of International Arbitration and the Cairo Regional Centre, as well as ad hoc arbitrations under the UNCITRAL and other arbitration rules. He has represented multi-national corporations and banks, as well as sovereign states or their state-owned entities (Egypt, Gabon, Guinea, Iran, Kuwait and Qatar), in international arbitrations. He has also served as chairman of the tribunal or co-arbitrator in such arbitrations.

Mr. Seppälä is an authority on international construction contracts, subcontracts, consortia, and joint venture agreements, and related securities and guarantees. He has considerable experience in international construction claims and disputes in relation to large, complex civil engineering, industrial and building projects, as well as claims under production sharing contracts in the oil and gas industry. He also acts as construction and arbitration counsel in project finance transactions, including B.O.T., D.B.O.T. and similar projects.

Mr. Seppälä is an Alternate Member of the United States to the International Court of Arbitration of the International Chamber of Commerce. He is also the Legal Advisor of the FIDIC (Fédération Internationale des Ingénieurs-Conseils) (the International Federation of Consulting Engineers) Contracts Committee, which prepares and publishes the most widely used standard forms of international construction contract.

Bars and Courts

• New York State Bar, admitted 1970
• Paris Bar, admitted 1974
• American and International Bar Associations

Education

• B.A., Harvard University, 1963
• J.D., Columbia Law School, 1967

Professional Associations

• Comité Français de l'Arbitrage, Indian Institute of Arbitration and Swiss Arbitration Association
• Fédération Internationale des Ingénieurs-Conseils (FIDIC), Affiliate Member and Recipient of the Louis Prangey award in 1999
• Institute of International Business Law and Practice, Paris, Corresponding Member
• International Chamber of Commerce Commission on International Commercial Arbitration
• American and International Bar Associations

Languages

• English
• French