Cross-Border
Legal Counsel in Italy

Italy is a civil-law jurisdiction built on its civil code and code of civil procedure. Disputes are decided by professional judges across a structure running from the Tribunale through the Courts of Appeal (Corti d'appello) to the Court of Cassation (Corte di Cassazione), the highest court for civil and commercial matters.
The most important practical feature for foreign parties is the reputation of ordinary Italian civil procedure for length. This is not merely an inconvenience — it changes strategy. Interim and protective measures, the choice of forum, and the use of settlement leverage all carry more weight when the alternative is a multi-year proceeding. Building the realistic timeline into strategy from the outset is essential.
Italy has established specialised business sections (sezioni specializzate in materia di impresa) within certain courts to handle corporate, IP, and competition matters, and these offer more predictable and expert handling of complex commercial disputes than the general civil courts.
The Golden Power regime gives the Italian government screening and veto powers over foreign investment in strategic sectors, and these powers have broadened considerably in recent years. For a non-EU buyer of an Italian target in a covered sector, Golden Power can affect timeline, structure, and conditions, and it must be planned for early in any transaction.
Foreign parties should also understand the practical weight of the Italian appeal structure. Because a first-instance judgment can be appealed on both fact and law, and because the system's length compounds at each level, the realistic horizon for a fully litigated Italian dispute can extend across years. This is precisely why precautionary measures, arbitration clauses, and settlement strategy carry such weight — they are the tools that manage an otherwise extended timeline, and planning for them is central rather than incidental.

For civil and commercial judgments from other EU member states, recognition and enforcement in Italy run through the Brussels Ia Regulation (Recast), without separate exequatur, with the debtor bearing the burden of any limited refusal grounds. For arbitral awards, Italy applies the New York Convention, and Italian courts recognise and enforce foreign awards in accordance with its narrow refusal grounds.
For judgments from outside the EU and outside applicable treaties, Italy applies its domestic rules on the recognition of foreign judgments, examining jurisdiction, due process, and public policy.
The practical challenge in Italy is less the recognition test than the execution phase, where the same procedural length that characterises Italian litigation can affect enforcement timing. Careful asset identification, correct sequencing, and the use of protective measures where dissipation is a risk are what determine whether enforcement delivers real recovery. We plan the execution strategy alongside the recognition application rather than treating it as a later step.
A practical feature of Italian enforcement worth planning for is the role of provisional and precautionary measures (misure cautelari), which allow a creditor to secure assets pending or during proceedings. Given the length of ordinary Italian litigation, these measures carry disproportionate strategic weight — securing a precautionary attachment early can preserve both the assets and the settlement leverage that the slowness of the main proceeding would otherwise erode.

The Milan Chamber of Arbitration is the principal Italian arbitral institution, and Milan is an established seat for European commercial arbitration. Italian courts apply the New York Convention to foreign awards and are generally supportive of the arbitral process. For a foreign party, arbitration can offer a route around the length of ordinary Italian litigation, which is one reason it features so often in Italian commercial contracts.
For litigation, the specialised business sections handle corporate, IP, and competition matters with greater predictability than the general civil courts. The choice between arbitration and the business sections turns on confidentiality, cost, the need for cross-border enforceability, and timetable — a choice we work through on the specifics of each matter.
The specialised business sections deserve particular mention for foreign parties. Concentrating corporate, IP, and competition matters before judges with genuine commercial expertise, they offer materially more predictable handling than the general civil courts, and where a dispute qualifies for their jurisdiction, that routing is itself part of the strategy.
For cross-border contracts with an Italian counterparty, the arbitration-versus-litigation choice is therefore frequently resolved in favour of arbitration at the drafting stage, precisely to avoid the length of the ordinary courts. Where a dispute has already arisen under a litigation clause, the specialised business sections and the strategic use of precautionary measures become the levers for keeping the matter moving — and we work within whichever framework the contract has fixed.

Italian matters that reach us cluster around the country's industrial economy and its family-owned corporate structures. Cross-border M&A is prominent: acquisitions of Italian industrial, fashion, food, and manufacturing targets, where Golden Power screening and the post-closing disputes that follow are recurring features. Italy's many family-controlled businesses also generate shareholder and governance disputes, particularly at moments of succession, sale, or external investment.
A second cluster is enforcement and recovery against Italian assets, where the procedural length of Italian execution makes strategy and sequencing decisive. A third is commercial and distribution disputes arising from Italian-law contracts, heard before the business sections or in Milan-seated arbitration.
We do not handle routine Italian domestic litigation, consumer matters, or high-volume collection. Our work is the cross-border dispute or transaction where the Italian component sits inside a larger picture and warrants Italian-qualified, partner-level attention.
Certain sectors recur in Italian matters: fashion and luxury, food and beverage, industrial machinery and automotive components, and energy. Many of these are dominated by family-controlled businesses, which is why succession, governance, and shareholder disputes — often triggered by a generational transition or an external investment — form such a consistent thread in the Italian work that reaches us.

Italian matters are run on the same coordination model as the rest of our practice: one partner owns the strategy, and any Italian local counsel or specialists act under that partner's instructions and report through us. The difference in Italy is that our desk is itself Italian-qualified, so the substantive proceedings are handled directly rather than relayed.
This is particularly valuable in Italy because of the procedural complexity and length of Italian litigation — coordination failures and strategic drift are more costly when the underlying proceedings are already slow. Owning the Italian element as one part of a single mandate, sequenced with the wider dispute, is how we keep an Italian matter moving and aligned with the overall strategy.

Italy rewards an Italian-qualified hand and early planning for both Golden Power and procedural timelines. We scope the Italian issues alongside every other jurisdiction in play, deliver a strategy memo with a procedural map and fee structure within five business days, run the Italian proceedings directly through our Italian-qualified desk, and report to you in English.

Italy rewards an Italian-qualified hand who understands both the procedural realities of Italian litigation — its length, and the consequent importance of interim measures and settlement leverage — and the strategic sectors covered by Golden Power. A foreign party who treats an Italian matter as straightforward tends to discover these realities too late and at cost.
VLO's value in Italy is a partner-led Italian relationship integrated with the firm's wider cross-border practice. The same Italian-qualified partner who structures a transaction understands the post-closing dispute that may follow; the partner who runs an Italian proceeding sees how it fits the broader multi-jurisdiction strategy.
For General Counsel and CFOs, this means a single accountable Italian relationship, transparent fees agreed at the outset, and the discretion that sensitive commercial and family-business disputes require.