News and Insights

The Speyside Latin America team details our specialized approach to healthcare communications in the region's complex regulatory landscape. Our Speyside Healthcare practice succeeds by integrating Corporate Affairs with Communications, focusing on patient needs, and leveraging both traditional and new media platforms. This holistic strategy is essential for navigating these high-growth and emerging markets successfully.

The Speyside Asia Pacific team is analyzing the RCEP launch, but sees the real story in the battle for digital trade standards in Southeast Asia, one of the world's fastest-growing high-growth and emerging markets. While RCEP's data governance rules are weak, China is aggressively pushing its "digital sovereignty" model. Western companies need a more sophisticated Corporate Affairs strategy than just warning about risks; they must offer a holistic, localized alternative.

The Speyside Team analyzes the collapse of two mining dams in Brazil—Mariana (2015) and Brumadinho (2019)—that serve as a critical lesson in crisis management. Vale’s lack of crisis preparedness, transparency, and stakeholder communication severely damaged its reputation. Poor risk management, delayed responses, and ignored warnings worsened public perception. In high-growth and emerging markets, proactive Corporate Affairs and robust risk assessment are not optional; they are essential for survival.

The Speyside Central Eastern Europe team is analyzing a surprising shift: Hungary’s opposition won key local elections, including the Budapest mayoralty, breaking Fidesz’s decade-long dominance. Scandals, a weak campaign, and unified opposition helped drive the upset. This development underscores the need for sophisticated Corporate Affairs and government relations strategies to navigate the inevitable friction between the national government and new opposition-led municipalities.

The Speyside corporate affairs team in Africa is closely analyzing the Eskom crisis in South Africa, one of the continent's key high-growth markets. While the utility's implosion requires serious crisis management, our analysis shows the real investment opportunity is not in the distant privatization of Eskom itself. Instead, President Ramaphosa's pragmatic reforms are creating significant opportunities in the Power & Renewables sector by opening the market for Independent Power Producers (IPPs) and off-grid C&I solar. Navigating these new openings will require sophisticated Corporate Affairs strategies to engage with the liberalization of small-scale generation.