Product Liability

Product liability issues can be complex and costly and cause serious reputational damage. 

Our product liability team are experts on product liability and recall. We act for clients across the supply chain, and their insurers, on product recalls and crisis response, business and personal injury claims, product liability insurance and subrogated recoveries.

Our local and international relationships mean we can work with the technical experts required for crisis management, whatever the industry. We work with them and our clients to handle the legal, regulatory, political and media issues that often arise and to preserve our clients’ reputations and commercial relationships. 

Our experienced product liability specialists also work with our clients to help prevent problems before they occur. We advise our clients on their responsibilities and assist them to put in place effective compliance measures.

Our experienced product liability team have acted on contamination scares and matters involving products as diverse as agricultural chemicals, building products, electronics, food and beverage products, and pharmaceuticals.

Our clients are local and international. We help our New Zealand based clients, and their insurers, deal with product liability and recall issues here and overseas.  We have also recently acted on product liability matters for major multinational corporations based in Australia, Austria, China, Finland, Germany, Japan, Singapore, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America.

Work Highlights

HDI Gerling

We have acted in several complex multi-claimant cross-border product liability and insurance litigation, including Ludgater v Gerling in the Supreme Court.

Various clients

We acted for a multinational in multiple product liability claims in the horticultural industry.

We acted for an insurer on a product liability claim relating to the supply of agricultural products which damaged crop.

We acted for a New Zealand based electrical company with global operations, providing sensitive and strategic advice and working with technical experts in Europe and the US.

We have acted for major multinational corporations on product safety investigations by New Zealand regulators and product recalls.

We acted for the defendant in Kroma v TridonicAtco and Ayr Management v TridonicAtco until the claims were ultimately discontinued by the plaintiffs.

Our Experts