The Government has announced as part of the Budget that it will introduce a new multinational anti-avoidance law into Part IVA of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1936. The new law will apply to tax benefits obtained on or after 1 January 2016. It is aimed at 30 identified multinationals with Australian sales agency arrangements that the Government claims may artificially avoid having a taxable presence in Australia – and will seek to subject them to income tax, withholding tax and penalties as if they did have such a presence. An exposure draft of the new Multinational Anti-Avoidance Law (MAAL) legislation and Explanatory Material has been released (with submissions due by 9 June 2015). Partner Toby Knight and Senior Associate Jennifer Richards outline the proposed new measure and explore its implications.

The recent hacking of website AshleyMadison.com has exposed the website’s parent companies to lawsuits in the US and Canada and has attracted the attention of the Australian Privacy Commissioner. The Ashley Madison hack will undoubtedly fuel the perception that threats to privacy are growing in the digital age. Partner Gavin Smith, Senior Associate Aleisha Brown and Law Graduate Shelley Drenth examine the litigation risks that stem from incidents of cyber-attack or data breach.

Many startups look to grow their team by engaging interns, work experience students and other unpaid workers.

At the core of many successful startups is a simple but brilliant idea.

The term sheet is the key document that determines the basis on which VCs and other investors will invest in your startup. This means that it’s crucial to get the basics right from the outset.

The new package of legislation overhauling Australia’s foreign investment laws, the first major revision in 40 years, commenced on 1 December 2015. While many features of the previous regime have been retained (and sometimes re-named), there are also a number of significant changes. Partners Jeremy Low, Wendy Rae and Richard Kriedemann and Senior Associate Eve Regnard review the key new elements.

The Federal Government’s electronic health records system may have a new lease on life following the introduction of a new Bill that attempts to improve the system’s effectiveness with key changes such as the transition to an ‘opt-out’ approach. Partner Ian McGill, Senior Associate Phil O’Sullivan and Associate Emily Cravigan report.

If you’re focused on testing your idea, developing your product and scraping together enough funds to talk to foundation customers, engaging a lawyer could be the last thing on your mind.

The new Turnbull Cabinet has made clear its intention to support innovation, so that Australia can have a thriving economy. The Treasury has already done some work in this area, releasing a consultation paper on crowd-sourcing equity funding (CSEF) for startups and small business.

In an eagerly awaited appeal decision in <em>RPL Central v The Commissioner of Patents</em>, the Full Federal Court has decided that the evidence-gathering method the subject of RPL Central’s innovation patent was a ‘mere scheme’, abstract idea or business method that did not constitute patentable subject matter. Partner Chris Bird and Senior Associate Anthony Selleck report.

The Ideas Boom has arrived with the Federal Government’s National Innovation and Science Agenda. Central to the new agenda are a raft of tax and regulatory measures designed to encourage greater investment in startups to help them both get off the ground and to survive the ‘valley of death’ with greater access to Series A capital.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has unveiled the hotly awaited National Innovation and Science Agenda (NISA). The Prime Minister declared the beginning of the Ideas Boom, stating that ‘unlike the mining boom, this is a boom that can continue forever’. The NISA comprises more than 20 individual policies and will deliver $1.1 billion worth of measures to kick-start the Ideas Boom over the next four years. But, at first blush, the view of the Allens Accelerate team is that the measures will constitute a quantum leap for the startup landscape in Australia.

The Commissioner of Taxation has, in a recent Australian Senate Estimates hearing, expressed frustration that companies potentially subject to Australia’s cross-border anti-avoidance laws (including the new Multinational Anti-Avoidance Law or MAAL) which have documents offshore, outside the reach of his access powers, are not providing him with relevant information – either at all, or in what he regards as a timely manner. He has threatened to raise assessments, which would force these companies to object against those assessments and provide further information if they wish to prove the assessments are excessive. Although affected non resident entities may not have assets in Australia, this does not mean the Commissioner will be unable to enforce the tax debts which would arise on such assessments.

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal has overturned the Grubb determination of the Commonwealth Privacy Commissioner and found that mobile network data from an individual’s phone activity does not constitute ‘personal information’ under the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth). Partners Michael Pattison and Gavin Smith and Associates Priyanka Nair and Tom Kavanagh report on this important decision that provides further guidance on the requirement for personal information to be information ‘about an individual’.

We look at how Australia keeps up to date with international best practice by amendments to ACICA arbitral rules and international arbitration laws; potential improvements and innovations identified in the 2015 Queen Mary University of London International Arbitration Survey; the investor-state dispute settlement mechanism under the Trans Pacific Partnership agreement; and in Hong Kong, increasing support for third party arbitration funding and the introduction of arbitrator ‘report cards’. This issue has been edited by Partner Andrea Martignoni and Senior Associate Catherine Li.

A recent decision of the English High Court may pave the way for the use of ‘predictive coding’ in large scale discovery and regulatory investigations in Australia. Partners Nick Rudge and Duncan Travis, Managing Associate Kate Austin and Associate Emily Giblin look at the benefits and risks of the new software.

There were three announcements this week that will serve to bolster the emerging Australian FinTech sector. The Government released a statement in support of FinTech as part of its National Innovation and Science Agenda, while ASIC issued two sets of guidance: an information sheet for providers of marketplace lending products, and draft guidance to providers of digital financial product advice. Partner Gavin Smith, Managing Associate Valeska Bloch, Senior Associate Simun Soljo and Senior Paralegal Connie Ye report.

The Federal Government has introduced a Bill detailing tax concessions to incentivise investment into Australian startups.

A New South Wales legislative committee has released a report following an inquiry into remedies for serious invasions of privacy in New South Wales. In an unexpected and controversial move, the report recommends that the NSW Government ‘take the lead’ by introducing a statutory cause of action for serious invasions of privacy. Partner Gavin Smith and Lawyers William Coote and Laura Bereicua look at the controversial report which, if it were to be enacted, will allow individuals to sue companies for invasions of privacy.

The Federal Government has introduced a narrow package of media ownership reform which, if enacted, will reduce the restrictions imposed by the Broadcasting Services Act 1992 (Cth) on the ownership of media assets across platforms and markets. Partner Ian McGill and Lawyer Ben Murphy report on these deregulatory changes that have the potential to spark consolidation among traditional media operators.