About Us

Maura Abeln Smith is the founder of Maura A. Smith Law Offices LLC, a boutique law firm that opened in 2016. Offices are located in New Canaan, CT, and New York City, NY. Previously, Ms. Smith was Executive Vice President, General Counsel and General Secretary of Delhaize Group before she left the firm in 2013 to start her own practice.

Fernando Koury Lopes is a partner at Koury Lopes Advogados which he established in 2002. Known for his Corporate and M&A and Wealth Management work, he is head of the department and led the team that counselled Thomson Reuters when it absorbed Revista dos Tribunais.

Russ is a partner in the Vorys Columbus office and serves as the firm’s managing partner. Russ engages in the practice of general corporate and contract law, including mergers, acquisitions, divestitures and initial public offerings (IPO). He acts as general counsel to a variety of public and private corporations. Russ received his J.D. from Columbia University School of Law and his B.A. from Rutgers University. Russ is a member of the American Bar Association, the Ohio State Bar Associ...

Guido Santiago Tawil is the partner in charge of the Arbitration and Economic Regulation and Administrative Law departments. His work focuses on regulatory practice, complex litigation and international arbitration. In regulatory matters he has represented the most important local and international companies on issues relating to telecommunications, the supply, transport and distribution of electricity and gas, postal services, water providers and waste disposal services, public works, IT, th...

Dr. Wolfgang Kühn is a senior partner of Heuking, a major German law firm with about 350 lawyers and offices in Berlin, Brussels, Chemnitz, Cologne, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Munich, Stuttgart and Zurich. The firm engages in general corporate and commercial, international arbitration and M&A.

Benjamin F. Wilson is the Managing Principal of Beveridge & Diamond, P.C. He has been lead counsel in many complex environmental litigation and regulatory matters for major consumer products corporations, retailers, oil and gas companies, municipalities, and developers. He has represented financial bodies on a wide variety of environmental issues pertaining to the sale and ownership of real property, and on wetlands and Endangered Species Act litigation, as well as several complex commerc...

Michel advises many public, state-owned and private corporations in various sectors, including institutional fund management, energy, manufacturing, commercial, financial services and brokerage. He also advises foreign companies on their establishment or acquisition projects in Canada. He has developed special expertise in regulatory compliance, advising corporate executives and directors, take-over bids, underwritings, private placements, stock exchange listings, offering memoranda, broker r...

For over 25 years, Ricardo has practiced complex commercial litigation and corporate counseling primarily in federal courts and international arbitration proceedings involving First Amendment defense, product liability, lender's liability, distribution, franchising and trade regulation issues. Since 1987, Ricardo has appeared as lead counsel, primarily for the defense, for many Fortune 500 companies in approximately 50 reported federal cases, that comprise 18 appeals successfully argued or br...

John Tishler has over 25 years of experience. An insolvency and restructuring attorney by trade, John deals in both the transactional and litigation arenas. He focuses mainly on corporate insolvency/board advice, creditor's rights, financial services, and defaulted bonds.

David Frick is Senior Vice President, Corporate Governance, Compliance and Corporate Services on the Executive Board of Nestlé. Prior to joining Nestlé, Mr. Frick was Group General Counsel, Head of Legal and Compliance at Credit Suisse Group in Zurich. Mr. Frick received a JD degree from Zurich University and a Masters of Laws degree from Harvard Law School. He is a member of the Zurich and the New York bar. Mr. Frick is a member of the Boards of economiesuisse, ICC Switzerland and Allianz Su...

Mr. Brocker specializes in commercial litigation and arbitration and has acted as counsel in a large number of Swedish and international proceedings. His arbitration experience includes acting as counsel to parties in international ICC Arbitrations, international UNCITRAL and Stockholm Chamber of Commerce arbitrations and in numerous national arbitrations. He is co-chair of the firm’s Shipping and transportation group and has extensive experience in shipping related matters such as joint vent...

Regina M. Pisa is the Chairman Emeritus of Goodwin Procter LLP, a leading Global 50 law firm with more than 900 attorneys, serving clients from locations in the United States, Europe and Asia. Ms. Pisa led the firm as Chairman, and before that also as Managing Partner, for more than 16 years, from 1998 through September 2014. Her practices include banking, higher education, financial institutions, and M&A/corporate governance.