Kelvin Aw is a Partner in CMS Singapore, and a Director in CMS Holborn Asia, the Formal Law Alliance between CMS Singapore and Singapore law practice, Holborn Law LLC. He is Co-Head of the Infrastructure and Construction practice in Singapore. He brings more than 2 decades of court room and board room experiences to champion clients’ interests not only in contentious but also transactional matters, with particular specialisation in the construction, engineering, and infrastructure sector.
On contentious briefs, he appears before all levels of the Singapore Courts, and also before tribunals in statutory adjudications under Singapore’s Building and Construction Industry Security of Payment Act (Cap. 30B), and in international and domestic arbitrations under various arbitral institutions including the Asian International Arbitration Centre (Malaysia) (AIAC), International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC), and China International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission (CIETAC). He delivers consistently with an impressive track record in all matters, in part due to his specialist knowledge of building and construction law.
On transactional matters, he provides advice to clients throughout the changing dynamics of any project cycle, ranging from front-end structuring and procurement to back-end work in which disputes have arisen. Together with co-head of the practice Lynette Chew, they are regularly engaged by clients on large-scale, landmark development matters not only in Malaysia, but also in Singapore, China, India, Indonesia, Cambodia, Vietnam, Malaysia, Myanmar, and the Middle East. These range from infrastructure projects and power plants to buildings for residences, commerce and high tech industries such as data centres.
Kelvin is consistently ranked as a leading individual by various legal ranking directories for his expertise in construction, projects & energy, as well as dispute resolution. These include Chambers Asia-Pacific: Leading Lawyers for Business, Legal 500, Best Lawyers and Benchmark Litigation.
Kelvin is regularly invited to participate in key industry and sector conferences as a speaker, and to deliver trainings to his clients on key legal updates that are essential to their business, including conferences and events organised by the Society of Construction Law, FIDIC and the Dispute Resolution Board Foundation (DRBF) in the ASEAN region.
He is also a Senior Accredited Specialist for Building and Construction recognised by the Singapore Academy of Law. He is a fellow of the Singapore and Chartered Institutes of Arbitrators, and an accredited Senior Adjudicator with the Singapore Mediation Centre. In addition, he has served on the Council of the Singapore Institute of Arbitrators and has taught construction law modules at the National University of Singapore. Kelvin also serves on the board of the Caregiving Welfare Association, having formerly been appointed as its President from 2016 to 2019.