Michael Bacon

Commercial Litigation / Class Actions / ESG litigation / Copyright / Database law / Intellectual Property / Media law

Michael joined Kennedy Van der Laan in 2015 after having worked at the Amsterdam District Court’s summary proceedings team for 10 years. He is an associate in our Intellectual Property and Media team and specializes in collective actions.

Michael is a senior expert litigator who regularly advises on and litigates large and complex cases for various domestic and international clients, ranging from collective (class) actions and more generic commercial disputes to specific intellectual property and media issues. In doing so, he benefits from the experience acquired during his years at the court which leaves him with a broad knowledge of civil procedural law and, more importantly, a good understanding of how judges think.

Since the introduction of the new class action regime (WAMCA) in 2020, Michael has strongly focused on this new area of law. Michael is involved in various large commercial class actions and also regularly advises non-profit organizations on (class action) ESG litigation opportunities.

• Represents the Stichting Emission Claim (the foundation acting as plaintiff) in three separate class actions against various car manufactures for their role in the Dieselgate scandal in The Netherlands including Mercedes, Renault, Opel and Citroen.
• Represents the Stichting Right to Consumer Justice (the foundation acting as plaintiff) in a class action against Apple for abuse of dominance in its Dutch App Store.
• Assisted an international collective management organizations in negotiations with a domestic collective management organization on collective rights issues.
• Advised a large domestic bank on database rights and the legal aspects of scraping.