December Edition 2019

7 With regards to the enforcement of arbitration agreements involving foreign parties, “Israeli courts, by and large, uphold the awards including assistance in materializing assets or imposing attachments that will enable the prompt execution of arbitration awards. There is no bias, patent or even latent, towards foreign parties, ” states Fisher. With regards to the awards and costs of arbitration proceedings in Israel, “there are not many known awards that might be regarded as outstanding and usually the costs will be equally divided between the parties or awarded against the so-called losing party.” “Looking at more commercial developments in the world of arbitration, there has been a large increase in the number of women appointed by arbitrations,” said Coleman. Questions of diversity in arbitrations more broadly are also being raised, with many holding that more diversity across panels improves the quality of decision-making. This reflects a general change in culture, but also an increase in diversity of origin of the parties holding arbitrations with a London seat,” she adds. “There is a greater emphasis on diversity in Tribunal appointments,” agrees Darowski, who also underlines “an increased awareness of cybersecurity and need for data protection in the conduct of proceedings.” “The use of new technologies in arbitration is very much a hot topic: development in AI and video-links will make document storage and review, as well the holding of conferences, more efficient and seamless, Coleman reiterates. With arbitration often considered a more timely and productive solution than litigation, there is the potential to make these technologies even more effective. “The new UK Disclosure Pilot Scheme and the court’s encouragement to use technology assisted reviewmay speed up the process, but as the scheme has only been around less than a year, the extent is as yet unclear,” says Coleman. Growing Diversity in Decisions Technology is definitely a significant factor