Rato, Ling, Lei & Cortés – Advogados | Lektou is a law office established in the Macau Special Administrative Region with its roots in the law office Gonçalves Pereira & Rato which started its operations on 2 October 1985.
With over 35 years of legal practice in Macau, the solid academic profile combined with long experience and full integration in Macau is the guarantee of the quality of the services we provide. Our team comprises qualified professionals able to provide a wide range of legal services.
The constant need to update and specialize our professionals, combined with proven professional practice in the various fields of law, enables us to offer a fast, effective, and efficient response to our Clients. The services we provide range from intervention in negotiations, litigation, and alternative dispute resolution hearings to daily and ongoing consultancy and legal advice in the various fields of law.
We provide legal services in three languages and in the jurisdictions where we have a presence, with a special focus on Macau SAR, to enhance the value of our Clients.
The office also has the significant added value of notarial services, having the professional collaboration of four Private Notaries.
We were the first Macau based law office to integrate Chinese-speaking and cultural partners, always maintaining a balance between the two structural pillars of Macau, ways of life, and thinking of mutual enrichment, with the ultimate goal of better serving our Clients.
We were the first office to have a presence in Hengqin Island, Zhuhai, following the establishment of the pilot measures for the union of law firms in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), Macau, and Hong Kong.
Hengqin plays an crucial role in the Guangdong-Macao-In-Depth Cooperation Zone, which focuses on the mission to “advocate Macao’s moderate economic diversification,” and is defined as “a new platform to boost Macao’s economic diversification, new space for Macao residents to live and work, new model to enrich the practice of ‘one country, two systems,’ and new ground for building up the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.”
We have since integrated an office in Shenzhen and we foresee being able to expand our business to other locations and jurisdictions.
We are well-positioned as one of Macau’s reference law offices in the context of the Greater Bay Area and Macau as a platform between China and the Portuguese-speaking countries.
In 2017, Rato, Ling, Lei & Cortés, through its Partners, incorporated a law firm in the Portuguese capital, Lisbon – Rato & Cortés, Sociedade de Advogados, SP, RL – which has experienced lawyers from Macau and Portugal providing legal services in that jurisdiction.
The expansion to Portugal is part of the office’s internationalization strategy to better serve its clients and to function as a legal player on the platform between the PRC, the Portuguese-speaking countries, and the European Union.
In 2016, we partnered with Zhong Yin Law Firm of the People’s Republic of China and the Fongs Law Firm of Hong Kong to open a new office in Hengqin, Zhuhai, which was the first law firm of this nature after the pilot measures for the consortium of law firms in Hong Kong, Macau and the PRC were established and adopted the name ZLF Law Office.
As part of the same pilot measure, we have integrated an office in Shenzhen and anticipate being able to expand to other locations and jurisdictions.
This is our response to the growing integration of the economy in the Pearl River Delta region and the national “One Belt, One Road”, “Greater Bay Area” and “Guangdong-Macao-In-Depth Cooperation Zone” policies. This initiative also represents an important milestone in our integration strategy in Mainland China, Hong Kong, and the Asia-Pacific Region.
The ZLF Law Office combines synergies of the wide network formed by the three consortium firms, which includes about 2000 lawyers in more than 30 cities in the PRC.
One of the prime goals is to serve Macau’s clients under the Guangdong-Macau Intensive Cooperation Zone.
We have recently entered into a protocol allowing us to join the global network of the Miranda Alliance, which has offices in all Portuguese-speaking jurisdictions, gathering approximately 230 lawyers in 18 jurisdictions, based in 4 continents.
All Miranda Alliance members are independent firms, run by professionals of the highest reputation, who are deeply integrated into their local markets with the same goal: to provide high-quality legal services to their clients.
This national project aims to create and develop an integrated economic area with global expression by 2035, deepening cooperation between the Guangdong Province and the Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and Macau, an area with the highest urban population density, with approximately 72 million inhabitants (5% of China’s total population), and which is among the four largest economic areas of global references, such as New York, Tokyo, and San Francisco Bay Area.
The project area includes nine megacities in the Guangdong Province (Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Foshan, Dongguan, Zhongshan, Jiangmen, Huizhou, and Zhaoqing) and the Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and Macau.
The aggregate Gross Domestic Product of this region is competitive with the world’s largest economies, and the most successful companies are established there, with a particular focus on technology companies.
In this context and intending to develop as a global center for tourism and leisure, Macau has become a platform for economic and commercial cooperation between China and the Portuguese-speaking countries.
To establish a basis for exchange and cooperation with Chinese culture and economy as the central axis and the coexistence of different cultures; to promote the appropriately diversified and sustainable development of Macau’s economy are the goals to be pursued!
This initiative was launched in 2013 by the Central People’s Government of the PRC to promote investment in approximately 70 countries and international organizations as a strategy to benefit, through economic growth, its member countries.
The initiative aims to develop major investments in infrastructure such as ports, buildings and constructions, railways, roads, power plants, as well as the development of road and rail transport routes through Central Asia, and sea routes in Southeast Asia.
Focusing on the mission to “advocate Macao’s moderate economic diversification,” the zone is defined as “a new platform to boost Macao’s economic diversification, new space for Macao residents to live and work, new model to enrich the practice of ‘one country, two systems,’ and new ground for building up the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.”
According to the initiative, “three phased development goals are stipulated. By 2035 the zone’s economic strength and technological competence will be greatly enhanced with an efficient public service and social security system and better collaboration mechanism between Hengqin and Macau. The goal to promote Macau’s economic diversification will also be basically realized”.
With lawyers registered in Portugal, Timor-Leste, Brazil, and Cabo Verde, our strategic positioning is to serve our clients to and from these jurisdictions, bridging the gap between China and the Portuguese-speaking countries. Macau is a privileged platform for this purpose, of which Forum Macau is the most relevant entity.