Restructuring across borders: Toolkit for Germany

Germany's Act on the Stabilization and Restructuring Framework for Businesses, universally referred to as the StaRUG, represented a significant shift when it came into force. It gave German companies a pre-insolvency restructuring tool with real teeth — the ability to bind dissenting creditors to a court-confirmed plan without triggering formal insolvency proceedings. In the years since, it has been tested in some of Germany's most high-profile restructurings, and its practical limitations and advantages are now considerably better understood. 

Christopher Poel, senior knowledge lawyer at A&O Shearman, is joined by Philipp Zehlicke from A&O Shearman's Frankfurt Restructuring team. The conversation examines what the StaRUG introduced, how it has changed the strategic calculus for German restructurings, and what the most significant real-world deployments of the procedure reveal about its strengths and the boundaries of its application. Which types of restructuring has the StaRUG proven most effective for? Where has it encountered friction, and how have courts responded? And what should international creditors and investors understand about the StaRUG's interaction with cross-border insolvency frameworks? 

Restructuring lawyers, distressed investors, and advisers working with German corporate debtors will leave this episode with a current and practically grounded view of how Germany's restructuring framework has evolved and where the StaRUG fits within it. 

Restructuring Across Borders maps the restructuring and insolvency landscape across more than 50 jurisdictions worldwide, drawing on the expertise of A&O Shearman's global restructuring group and its partner law firms. Each episode examines the pre-insolvency tools, court-supervised procedures, and emerging developments in a specific jurisdiction, with a focus on the practical implications for debtors, creditors, and cross-border advisers. The series accompanies A&O Shearman's Restructuring Across Borders Toolkit, a free reference resource available at aoshearman.com.