J. William F. Rowley
20 Essex Street Chambers, 20 Essex Street
London WC2R3AL
United Kingdom
Suite 900, 333 Bay Street
Toronto, Ontario M5H 2R2
Canada
Appointed Queen’s Counsel in 1983, he was elected chairman of McMillan LLP in 1996 and chairman emeritus and special counsel on his retirement from the partnership in 2009. He relinquished the latter roles in 2014. Founded in 1903 McMillan is one of Canada’s leading law firms. He joined 20 Essex Street Chambers in 2002. 20 Essex Street is one of England’s preeminent, and longest established sets of chambers practicing in the international arbitration field in both commercial and public international law. He is described as a “star performer”, (Legal Business Arbitration Report 2006), one of London’s “super arbitrators”, (Global Arbitration Review, May 2006), “one of the elite international arbitrators” (The New Peacekeepers, 2005), “Exceptional”, “Olympian”, “no one ever leaves the chambers with a sense of injustice” (Chambers UK Guide, 2008), “a big character on the scene” (Chambers UK Guide 2009), “an extremely strong” arbitrator and a “sensible chairman” (Chambers Arbitration (International): Most in Demand Arbitrators” Global Wide, 2013), “widely acknowledged to be ‘as good as it gets’, particularly for energy disputes” (Who’s who Legal Arbitration 2016). “A top tier arbitrator” (Legal 500, 2017), “Regarded as one of the leading arbitrators in the world for international disputes” (Who’s Who Legal, 2018), “He possesses vast experience handling both commercial and public international law disputes” (Who’s Who Legal, 2018), “A Superb Arbitrator”, who is “very efficient and extremely charming” (Chambers & Partners, Global Guide, 2018).
Served as chairman of the LCIA from 2013 to 2017, he is a former member of the LCIA Court. He continues to serve on the board of directors of LCIA India (Pvt) Ltd. He is the past chairman of the International Bar Association, section on business law, as well as the past chairman of the IBA antitrust and trade committee and its global form on competition policy. He served as a non-executive member of the board of directors of the AVIVA Group Canada Ltd from 1996-2014, a past member of the board of governors of the International Capital Markets Group and is an honorary life member and council member of the International Bar Association.
He is a member of the National Panel of Arbitrators for Canada; ICC, Paris; panel of arbitrators of the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID, a member of the World Bank Group); and a former member of the advisory committee on private commercial disputes of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Further panel memberships include those of ADR Chambers International; the American Arbitration Association (ICDR Panel of Neutrals), Dublin and New York; the Arbitration Foundation of South Africa; the German Institute of Arbitration, Cologne; the Kuala Lumpur Regional Center for Arbitration, Malaysia; the International Arbitral Centre, Vienna; the Indian Council of Arbitration, New Delhi; the Australian Centre for International Commercial Arbitration, Melbourne; and the Hong Kong and Singapore international arbitration centres.
He has chaired or participated as a tribunal member or counsel in over 200 international and national arbitrations. These have involved a variety of national laws and investment treaty systems including those of ICSID, NAFTA, England, many European states, Abu Dhabi, Argentina, Azerbaijan, Belize, Bermuda, China, Dubai, Georgia, Grenada, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ivory Coast, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Thailand, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uganda, Venezuela and Canada, as well as New York, Delaware and California. In addition to multiple ICC and LCIA arbitrations, he has conducted cases under other rules such as those of UNCITRAL, the AAA, SCC, SIAC, HKIAC and a number of domestic regimes. Recent arbitrations have included petroleum industry joint ventures (Iraq oil fields, over US$20 billion; offshore Nigerian oil fields, over US$4 billion, Kuwait oil fields, over US$7 billion), gas pricing and repricing formulae (Belgium, Canada, Italy, Qatar and US), Bermuda form insurance claims (Bermuda, New York and London), international trademark licensing (Germany, Japan, US and UK), various investor and state disputes (ICSID, NAFTA and UNCITRAL), international telecoms licensing (EU, US, India and Bermuda), telecoms joint ventures (Australia, Mauritius, India, UK and US), oil supply contracts (Poland and Russia, Netherlands and Russia, and Venezuela and US, Hungary and Ukraine) production-sharing contracts and AMIs for petroleum products (Africa, Australia, Singapore and India), aerospace defence contract dispute (US, UK and France), power supply projects (Hungary, Mexico, Peru, Philippines and Taiwan), water and sewage services investment dispute (ICSID, Argentina and France), gasoline additives investment dispute (NAFTA, Canada and US), and telecoms investment dispute (UK and Belize).
He is co-author (with Donald I Baker) of Rowley & Baker: International Mergers – the Antitrust Process (3rd edition), Sweet & Maxwell 2007;
Mr. Rowley is chairman of the editorial board of Global Arbitration Review, general editor of GAR – The Guide to Energy Arbitrations (Autumn 2015), GAR – The Guide to Challenges and Enforcement of Arbitration Awards (forthcoming, 2019) and was founding editor of Arbitration World, The European Lawyer Reference Series (2004-2012).