Bilingual and bicultural, Chris (Xiaoyun) Lin is widely recognized as a leading labor lawyer and public policy advisor among both Chinese entities and multinational corporations doing business in China. Mr. Lin has represented Chinese government agencies in the United States and has represented American and other foreign companies in China.
Immediately prior to joining Akin Gump, Mr. Lin served as the labor counsel for the General Electric Company (GE) for Greater China. In that capacity, he supervised all labor related matters in the six GE business groups in mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, He developed company-wide guidelines for employment practices to assure legal compliance and advised all GE HR teams on daily legal problems arising from GE operations across the region. As a member of GE’s highly regarded public policy group, Chris played a leading role in formulating the company’s public policies and its legal strategies.
Mr. Lin also was instrumental in drafting formal comments on several important new Chinese labor laws on behalf of trade organizations such as AmCham-China, AmCham-Shanghai, and China Enterprises Confederation (CEC).
Before joining GE’s in-house law department, Mr. Lin was a partner in the New York office of DeHeng Law Firm, representing Chinese government institutions, Chinese media, and major Chinese companies in U.S. transactions, intellectual property matters, and litigation. From 1999 to 2004, he was outside counsel for the Bank of China in the United States, advising it on banking law and commercial transactions and representing it in litigation.
Chris received his B.A. degree from Williams College, his J.D degree from the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in New York, and his M.P.A. degree from Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon.