Doing business in Austria

Billing rates are governed by the Austrian Lawyers' Scale of Fees Act. The Austrian Bar Association also issues guidelines on fees. Most foreign clients are billed on an hourly basis to spare them the intricacies of the Act. Fixed-fee lump sums are popular in litigation, but if a party agrees to pay more than the rate, the additional fees are not recoverable from the losing party. Contingency or success-related fees are prohibited, but a fixed percentage of the claim can be negotiated as a bonus in advance.

One of the richest countries in the  EU, Austria enjoys a very high standard of living. A well-developed social market economy benefits from strong links to other EU economies, especially Germany's. Two-thirds of Austria's exports - which include machinery, metals, paper, textiles, food and livestock - are destined for other EU countries.

Foreign investors are attracted by Austria's access to the Single European Market and its proximity to the new EU economies. Austrian companies are increasingly investing into the Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) region as far as Turkey and the Ukraine.

In recent years, services industries, including a large banking sector, have become important to Austria's economy, and they now employ more than half of the nation's workforce. The industrial sector remains strong, while in the provinces, the agricultural sector is small, but well developed.

Before the economic downturn, the Austrian economy benefited from numerous mid-sized M&A deals taking place in the market, while the jurisdiction was also a popular location for structuring international M&A transactions. However, many major takeovers within Austria itself have fallen through in recent years. Plans by Austrian oil company, OMV to merge with the country's biggest utility group, Verbund, collapsed in 2006 due to political resistance. The Austrian Takeover Amendment Act came into effect in May 2006, substantially altering Austrian takeover law to bring it into line with EU directives.

Austria has a particularly dominant public sector, including the public financing of infrastructure. Many projects are finally coming to fruition - the electronic lorry-tolling system for motorways, which was implemented using a traditional BOT model is already operating successfully. Austria has also begun to expand into PPP projects - the A5 highway extension project being one example.