From August 27 to 28, 2022, the Second Invitational Moot Arbitration Competition of the Chinese Mainland, Hong Kong and Macao Colleges and Universities (IMAC) was successfully held. The two teams from Fudan University participated in the competition and achieved excellent results. Fudan Team One won the championship of the competition, as well as the Best Memo for Respondent Award and the Best Respondent's Brief for Respondent Award, while Fudan Team Two finished in the top 16 of the competition, with awards for the Best Brief for the Respondent and the Best Memo for the Respondent's Memo.

(Professor Wang Zhiqiang, Dean of Fudan University Law School, is presenting the award to the champion team)

The competition attracted 78 teams from 55 universities in the Mainland, Hong Kong and Macao. The case concerns a cross-border equipment sale and purchase contract dispute during the Covid-19 pandemic, touching upon controversial issues such as the validity of the arbitration agreement vis-à-vis the third party, the feasibility of online hearings, and the availability of force majeure.

The two Fudan teams were formed through a rigorous written and oral selection process. Team One is composed of Xu Jianing (LLB’24, team leader & oralist), Yu Yunke (LLB’25, oralist), Xu Cenyu (LLB’24, researcher), and Li Guanghua (JM’24, researcher), while Bai Lijie (LLB’25 team leader & researcher), Chen Lingyun (LLB’25, oralist), Chen Jining (LLB’25, researcher), and Qian Yuxin (JM’24, oralist) makes up Team Two. Both teams were coordinated by Prof. Chen Li and Dr. Wang Yiran and coached by Dr. Liu Yang and Dr. Liu Guiqiang with the assistance of Wang Lyuzhi (LLB’21 & LLM’24).

The competition began with a brief-writing phase, which produced the top 16 teams that advanced to the oral advocacy phase. The two Fudan teams ranked the second and the fifth place respectively in the overall score of the briefs and competed in the intensive oral phase. Ultimately, Fudan Team One was undefeated in all five matches consecutively to retrieve the championship trophy.

(Fudan team in the semi-final)

(Fudan team in the final)

The success of Fudan teams in IMAC is a testament to the continuous progress of the Fudan University Law School in moot court competitions, which benefits tremendously from the school’s implementation of the mechanism for cultivating foreign-related legal talents as well as the strong support from alumni and the legal community generally. Fudan University Law School will double down on its efforts to support and encourage students to participate in important moot court events at home and abroad, so as to provide better training for foreign-related legal talents with both solid legal knowledge and international vision.