justus kraner anlagenbau.jpg

In every issue of our newsletter we introduce people from our firm personally. This time it's the turn of Justus Kraner from our Cologne office.

Since February 2017, Justus Kraner has been working as a lawyer in the team of Jörn Zons in the Cologne office in building and plant construction law.

Born in Berlin (West), Justus Kraner grew up in the northern Black Forest. He attended the musical-latin branch of the monastery school of the Holy Sepulchre in Baden-Baden, where he also passed his high school diploma (Abitur).

After his civilian service (paramedic in the rescue service of the German Red Cross), Justus Kraner studied Middle and Modern History, Political Science and Art History at the University of Leipzig, to which he later added Arabic Studies, Oriental Philology and African Studies. After a stay abroad at the University of Milan, Mr. Kraner completed his studies with an academic degree of Magister Artium and began a doctoral project on the history of the 30-year war.

Inspired by his interest in the history of law, e.g. the history of the Imperial Chamber Court (Reichskammergericht), Justus Kraner began studying law (also at the University of Leipzig). This subject inspired him so much that he switched completely from a historical to a legal career. Justus Kraner completed his legal clerkship in the Ruhr area because he wanted to take the opportunity to get to know a region unknown to him. After his second state examination, he gained his first professional experience in a large Cologne law firm in the field of litigation. After a stopover in a smaller law firm ( in order to gain forensic experience more quickly), Justus Kraner searched and found his vocation in plant construction law at Friedrich Graf von Westphalen. He likes to deal with complex technical issues and finds the support of (large-scale) projects from planning to (if necessary) court proceedings very exciting. He particularly enjoys acting as a (quasi intercultural) interpreter between the technicians and the lawyers and bringing each of them closer to the other's way of thinking. An interesting challenge for Justus Kraner is to keep an eye on the current and future technical/technological developments in plant construction (i.e. in particular everything discussed under the headings "digitalization" and "industry 4.0"), because in the future topics such as IT law, know-how protection, data protection and data security, etc., will gain more and more importance (also) in plant engineering and will require competent advice.

For Justus Kraner, the contents of his first degree have meanwhile become a leisure activity. He reads what he can get his hands on, e.g. by Sarah Rose, For All the Tea in China: How England Stole the World's Favorite Drink and Changed History; by Tom Holland, Dynasty: The Rise and Fall of the House of Caesar; or by Sven Beckert, King Cotto: Eine Geschichte des globalen Kapitalismus. Since it is well known that examination is the best teacher, Justus Kraner also loves to travel. Future (dream) destinations are: Iran, Uzbekistan, Ethiopia and the tea-growing regions of China. In addition, Justus Kraner has been a music enthusiast since childhood and plays the piano (very modestly) himself, preferably Chopin and Schubert.

1:1. This is how we work together. You decide upon a competent partner; he/she will then remain your point of contact. > more