Conference Chair

Robert Head
Online and Commercial Director, Legal  
ASEAN & North Asia
Thomson Reuters
Based in Hong Kong, Robert heads the online and commercial services department of the ASEAN & North Asia (ANA) Legal business of Thomson Reuters which spans Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea.  As part of the ANA legal business leadership team, he oversees the management and development of the entire portfolio of online information services for legal professionals in ANA markets.

Robert has 13 years of online legal product development experience having worked first at Thomson (Sweet & Maxwell) in London and subsequently at Thomson Reuters Hong Kong Limited, where he successfully developed and launched Westlaw HK, Westlaw Malaysia, Westlaw Singapore, and now Westlaw Asia, Thomson Reuters’ newest legal research platform covering Asia and the common law world.

In addition, Robert is responsible for managing the Thomson Reuters eBook Portfolio across Asia under the British Legal Award–winning ProViewTM brand, the leading professional eReader platform.  His portfolio also includes the Asian Legal Business (ALB) online service and WestlawNext throughout the region.  Further, he heads up the team of legal customer trainers and the print production team at Thomson Reuters across the region.

Robert holds a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) degree in Business Studies from Sheffield Hallam University, UK.  

Neil Mcinnes
Partner
Pinsent Masons MPillay LLP, Singapore
Neil is a corporate criminal defence specialist with extensive experience of white collar crime investigations across Asia Pacific and Europe. Neil moved to Singapore in 2014 to set up Pinsent Masons' corporate crime practice in the region and assists clients with multi-disciplinary, cross-border investigations involving corruption, fraud, and money laundering and other regulatory issues. He is often instructed to conduct internal investigations for compliance and legal functions within corporates, working alongside forensic IT and accountancy professionals, as well as local lawyers in different jurisdictions throughout South East Asia. Neil's wider experience across a range of sectors includes numerous compliance mandates – such as designing and helping implement corporate compliance programmes; conducting anti-corruption due diligence reviews of local agents and JV partners; advice on anti-corruption issues arising in M&A transactions for businesses; crisis management and compliance advice for senior management teams in various higher risk markets throughout Asia.

Kimberley Cole
Head of Specialist Sales Asia
Financial & Risk 
Thomson Reuters
Kimberley is Head of Specialist Sales for the Asia Pacific region of Thomson Reuters’ financial and risk business – worth $6.5 billion. She is a member of the firm’s Asia Pacific executive leadership team –responsible for overseeing the sales and business development of Thomson Reuters’ suite of financial services, compliance, and risk products. In her role she oversees a team of more than 150 sales specialists. 

Kimberley celebrates a 25-year career with Thomson Reuters. She has worked across three continents with a total of eight cross-border moves. Her journey has seen her hold roles across marketing, product and business management, and sales. Her previous positions include Global Head of Marketing Operations and Head of Marketing Asia. Amongst her most significant accomplishments was her leadership role in the firms’ global customer advisory board program and in 2015 leading the Asia sales team to the number one spot in terms of top line growth for the entire global financial and risk business.  Kimberley is a director of Thomson Reuters Hong Kong with responsibility for sign-off of the unit’s audit.

In 2013 and 2014, Kimberley was named as one of Cranfield’s 100 women to watch from FTSE listed companies and Professional of the Year by AmCham HK in 2015. Kimberley has a Bachelor of Economics from Monash University in Australia and a post-graduate qualification from the Chartered Institute of Marketing in the UK.

Isabelle Spriggs
Practice Manager
Axiom Law
Isabelle Spriggs runs Axiom’s Singapore practice and works closely with General Counsel and legal departments across the region to improve their risk profiles, lower overall cost and create more value for their corporations.  Since joining Axiom, she has successfully worked to establish their financial services practice in London before opening their Singapore office in 2012.  Isabelle now oversees a large team of Singapore based consultants who support nearly half of the Fortune 100 and a number of the global investment banks. She began her career in executive search where she focussed on client development, consultative sales and key account management before joining Axiom in 2010. 

James Bitanga
APAC Legal Counsel - Alliances and Technology Ecosystems 
Accenture (Axiom Consultant)
James is an Axiom Consultant currently acting as the Asia Pacific Alliances and Technology Ecosystems Counsel at Accenture.  In this role, James acts as the legal subject matter expert on all formation, go-to-market, and resale activities of Alliance partners throughout Asia. His previous consulting engagements include legal support for the enterprises services division of a large global technology company, and development of a data privacy compliance program for a multi-national executive search firm. Within these engagements, he provides strategic consultancy for operational and organizational matters, part of which includes best practices in resource allocation and use of technology.  James is based out of Singapore having started his career in Asia with IBM supporting commercial technology matters.

In addition to legal consultancy, James is active in the startup scene as an angel investor and advisor to early and emerging tech startups in both Asia and out of the U.S.  Prior to his focus on technology, James was a securities fraud litigator in New York and is still a member of the New York State Bar. 

Jezamine Fewins
Partner
Stephenson Harwood
Jezamine acts for a number of multi-national companies which have established operations in Hong Kong. She has extensive experience in giving employment, business immigration and intellectual property advice.  In addition to assisting on pre-operation set up she also advises and represents clients in contentious matters.

Jezamine has acted in a large number of employment cases litigated through the High Court for employers and employees. She is well known for her work in relation to cases involving team moves, the enforcement of restrictive covenants and the misuse of trade secrets and confidential information.

Jezamine has a solid track record in respect of enforcement matters relating to clients’ intellectual property rights. She is often appearing in court to obtain prohibitive and mareva injunctions. She has been particularly successful in restraining cross border infringement activities and freezing accounts to which the proceeds of sales of counterfeit goods have been remitted.

Atty. Francisco Ed. Lim
Senior Partner, ACCRALAW
President, Shareholders’ Association of the Philippines (SharePHIL)
Atty. Francis Lim is a Senior Partner and a member of the Executive and Special Committees of the Angara Abello Concepcion Regala & Cruz Law Offices (ACCRALAW). Atty. Lim is the former president of the Philippine Stock Exchange; President – Shareholders’ Association of the Philippines (SharePHIL); Chairman, National Competitiveness Committee – Management Association of the Philippines; Chairman, Judicial System Working Group – National Competitiveness Council; Trustee – CIBI Foundation, Inc., FINEX Research & Development Foundation, Inc., Judicial Reform Initiative, Inc.; Fellow – Institute of Corporate Directors; a member of the Philippine Bar and the New York Bar.

He is a columnist of The Philippine Daily Inquirer; a law professor in the Ateneo de Manila University, San Beda Graduate School of Law; professorial lecturer and Vice-Chair – Commercial Law Department –Philippine Judicial Academy; a director of: Energy Development Corporation, The Insular Life Assurance Co., Ltd., Producers Savings Bank Corporation, Tower Development Bank, Inc.

Other involvements: 

Enactment of several Philippine laws: Financial Rehabilitation and Insolvency Act (FRIA),  Credit Investment System Act (CISA), Real Estate Investment Trust Act (REITA), Personal Equity Retirement Account Act (PERAA), Philippine Competition Act.

Formulation of several Philippine procedural rules: Interim Rules on Intra-Corporate Controversies, Rules on Electronic Evidence, Rules on Notarial Practice, Rules on DNA Evidence, Financial Rehabilitation Rules of Procedure, the Financial Liquidation and Suspension of Payments Rules of Procedure.

Alix Grice  
Acting Regional Counsel – AMEA
BT Global Services
Alix is Acting Regional Counsel, AMEA for British Telecom and has been with BT since 2013.  She has been based in Asia-Pacific for 25 years, working as a commercial lawyer specialising in media, technology and telecommunications law, as well as IPR, data protection and corporate governance and compliance.  She is qualified to practise in England & Wales, Hong Kong, Australia and Canada and has held a variety of positions in technology companies and international law practices supporting Africa, Middle East and Asia Pacific.

Blaise J. Benoit
Legal Director (Asia and Pacific Regions)
MRC Global Inc 
Blaise J. Benoit is Legal Director for the Asia and Pacific Regions of MRC Global Inc., a Fortune 500 distributor of pipes, valves and fitting products and services to the energy and industrial markets.  

Currently based in Singapore, Mr. Benoit has nearly 10 years of in-house counsel experience advising clients on international commercial, compliance, governance and dispute resolution matters.  Much of his career has been spent practicing in Southeast Asia including several years managing corporate legal departments in Jakarta, Indonesia and Singapore.  His current practice focuses primarily on global anti-bribery / anti-corruption compliance program implementation and management as well as corporate governance compliance across nine jurisdictions.

Mr. Benoit holds a Juris Doctor from the University of Houston Law Center.  He is a member of the Texas State Bar.

Christopher Lee
VP - Deputy Group General Counsel & Regional General Counsel APAC 
Schneider Electric
Christopher is the Deputy Group General Counsel and Regional General Counsel – Asia Pacific for Schneider Electric (a global specialist in energy management and automation).With a global legal department of over 250 people (including risks & insurance), Christopher leads the legal support for the Company’s Global Solutions and Projects, Global Strategic Accounts program, Global Supply Chain department, and functionally leads the new global Contract Management team.

Over recent years, Christopher has been responsible for re-aligning the legal network to better target support for the above global functions. Within Asia Pacific (excluding Greater China), he leads the APAC legal team in providing a full range of legal services to the 26 countries within the region and is Compliance Officer for APAC. Christopher created and built the APAC legal team in the last 7 years from a disparate team of 5 lawyers to a regional team of 26 people across 8 countries and has been with Schneider for over 10 years. 

He is a Solicitor, admitted to practice in Australia and New Zealand and left practice at a large Sydney-based law firm in 2000 after which he worked in-house at both Nestle and Kellogg’s prior to joining Schneider Electric.

Cathy Heeley
Vice President & Chief Counsel Asia Pacific
Mondelēz Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd 
Cathy is based in Singapore and leads the Mondelez Asia Pacific legal, compliance and security function.  The function supports businesses across Asia, including operations in Australia, India, China, Philippines, Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia Japan and Thailand as well as large joint ventures in Japan and Korea.  The Asia Pacific team has around 26 inhouse lawyers, compliance and security professionals as well as paralegals and assistants across the region.  Cathy has acted as legal counsel for various Asian jurisdictions for Kraft Foods since 2005.  Kraft Foods was renamed Mondelez International upon the spin off of the US cheese and grocery business in 2012.  Before Kraft Foods, Cathy was a Senior Associate at Allens Arthur Robinson in Melbourne, Australia working in Banking, M&A and general commercial roles.  Cathy has more than 20 years experience as an external and inhouse counsel.

Gladys Chun
General Counsel
Lazada Group
Gladys Chun is the General Counsel of Lazada GroupShe assumed the role in April 2014. As the GC, Gladys leads the Legal and Compliance department for Lazada group and is responsible for legal and compliance matters across all countries where Lazada has a local presence including Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam, Hong Kong and Russia. She supports the management by providing strategic guidance in commercial strategies and risk management across 3 business units including Lazada (B2C platform), helloPay (payments system) and LEX (logistics business). She has established a network of legal teams across the region, which has grown from a small team of 3 in April 2014 to the present total of approximately 35 legal support personnel in 5 countries. Gladys has recently closed the transaction with Alibaba whereby Alibaba acquired a controlling stake in Lazada with an investment totaling USD1billion. 

Gladys began her legal career at Baker & Mckenzie and after spending approximately 6 years with Baker, she left the firm in 2011 to join Yum! Brands- Asia Franchise Unit as their regional legal counsel where she was responsible for overseeing the franchised business of KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell across 14 countries covering North Asia, South East Asia and Pacific Islands. She spent approximately 3 years with Yum! before taking on the role as General Counsel of Lazada.

Gavin Ingram
General Counsel Asia Pacific & Vice President Strategic Planning 
Global Blue
Gavin Ingram is General Counsel Asia Pacific and Vice President Strategic Planning for Global Blue. Gavin also acts as Company Secretary for Global Blue’s Singapore entities. Prior to Global Blue, Gavin was Legal Director Asia for AdventBalance which is a new and innovative law firm that seconds their lawyers to sit with the clients during the term of the secondment.

Prior to AdventBalance, Gavin was General Counsel Asia for the Australian listed company BlueScope Steel (formerly BHP Steel) where Gavin managed all legal and compliance issues across BlueScope’s Asia footprint. In this role, Gavin was awarded the leading in-house counsel award in Asia-Pacific by AsiaLaw in 2007.

Gavin started his career in private practice as an infrastructure lawyer at Blake Dawson Waldron (as it then was, now Ashursts) and Freehills (now Herbert Smith Freehills). Gavin holds Law and Commerce degrees from Australia and most recently completed his MBA (with Honors) through the University of Chicago.

Gavin has significant experience in navigating the challenges of Asia’s diverse legal systems.

Ho How Wai,
Head, Compliance
Ascendas-Singbridge Pte Ltd
How Wai joined Ascendas in 2008 and advised on real estate transactions in Southeast Asia and Australia for private real estate funds.  He currently oversees the legal and regulatory compliance framework for the Ascendas-Singbridge group of companies and the listed Ascendas Hospitality and India Trusts. How Wai graduated in 1994 from the National University of Singapore with an LL.B (Hons) degree.  He was in private practice in Singapore, Bangkok (from 2000 to 2005) and Dubai (from 2006 to 2008) prior to joining Ascendas, and had advised on general litigation matters, foreign investment transactions and merger and acquisitions.

James Lau 
Company Secretary
Chief Legal Officer 
NatSteel Holdings Pte Ltd
James, who has over 23 years of contentious and non-contentious international cross-border transactional experience acquired through a combination of private practice at industry-leading law firms and in-house roles at Fortune 500 Multinational Corporations, joined NatSteel Holdings Pte. Ltd., a TATA Enterprise, in September 2008 as Vice-President of Legal and Company Secretary and is currently its Senior Vice President, Chief Legal Officer and Company Secretary.

TATA Group’s total revenue in fiscal year 2014-2015 was USD108.78 billion, of which 70% was from outside India. Its key companies are Tata Communications Services Limited, Tata Motors Limited (of which Land Rover and Jaguar are part), Tata Power Limited and Tata Steel Limited.

Monisha Kamdar
Assistant General Manager 
Head of Legal
Raiffeisen Bank International AG, Singapore Branch
Monisha Kamdar is the Assistant General Manager and Head of Legal for Raiffeisen Bank International AG, Singapore and oversees the legal function for all of the Bank’s business in the entire APAC region (excluding China).  

Reporting to the CEO Asia Pacific of the Bank based in Singapore, she works alongside senior management and heads of departments providing legal support in all areas of transaction management for structured, mezzanine and trade finance transactions and also provides crucial support on workout matters, restructurings, litigation and risk management.  In addition, she advises on all new business initiatives in Asia and provides legal support to the board of management locally and in Austria.  

Monisha was the first legal hire for the Bank in Asia in October 2010 and was responsible for establishing the legal department and building it up, initially acting as sole general counsel in Asia (ex China).  She sits on the Bank’s Problem Loan Committee providing strategic legal and commercial advice on matters relating to recoveries and NPLs.   

Prior to this, Monisha was a senior attorney for 8 years at the Singapore office of Latham & Watkins, one of the world’s most prestigious US law firms. She primarily focused on project development and financing transactions across the Asia Pacific region and advised developers, contractors, project lenders and underwriters in the power, petrochemical and shipping industries.  Earlier on in her career, she also represented clients in corporate and capital markets transactions.

Stanley Park
Managing Director/Head of Legal – Asia Pacific
Scotiabank
Stanley Park is Managing Director and Head of Legal - Asia Pacific Region for Scotiabank's Global Banking and Markets Division. He is based in Singapore and is responsible for all legal matters across the region, including China, Japan, Korea, India, Australia, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Singapore. Among other responsibilities, Stanley provides (i) transactional advice and support to the Bank's businesses related to capital markets, investment banking, commodities, corporate lending/trade finance and global transaction banking; (ii) regulatory advice and support re the Bank's businesses; (iii) management of litigation and disputes; (iv) advice and support to the Bank's internal or proprietary functions (including proprietary investments, HR matters, Finance); and (v) participation in corporate governance or oversight.

Prior to joining Scotiabank, Stanley was with Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton and Coudert Brothers in NYC, from 1992 - 2001; with Salomon Smith Barney and UBS Securities in Tokyo from 2001 - 2007; with DKR Oasis, as Chief Compliance Officer, in Hong Kong in 2008; with Barclays Global Investors, as General Counsel, in Tokyo from 2009 - 2010; and with Daiwa Capital Markets, as Senior Legal Counsel, in Singapore and Hong Kong from 2011 - 2014. Stanley graduated from Princeton University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics in 1985 and received his law degree from the Harvard Law School in 1988, where he served as an editor of the Harvard Law Review.  Stanley has been a member of the New York State Bar since 1994.

Veronica Lai
General Counsel & Company Secretary
StarHub Ltd
As the General Counsel and Company Secretary for the StarHub Group, Veronica advises the Group on all legal aspects of operations, strategy and compliance matters. She also supports the Board Chairman and Directors on corporate secretarial matters. During her career with StarHub she oversaw the legal aspects of the merger of StarHub and Singapore Cable Vision, StarHub's successful IPO and the establishment of StarHub’s $1 billion MTN Programme. 

Under her leadership, the StarHub Legal team was recognised with various awards, including the Best Deal for Singapore for their role in the StarHub IPO by Asia Legal Business. Veronica received the 2007 AsiaLaw Singapore In-house Counsel Award by Asia Law and Practice, and was named by ALB as one of the Top 25 in-house counsels in Asia in 2010. In 2013, the StarHub team won the International Law Office's prestigious Global Counsel Award 2013 and Asia Pacific Counsel Award 2013, for their work in regulatory support.  For her corporate secretariat portfolio, Veronica was recognised with the Asian Company Secretary 2013 Award for Singapore by Corporate Governance Asia.  In 2014, the Legal team won the International Legal Alliance Gold Award for the Best Asian & South Pacific Legal Department.  Veronica is listed as one of the Legal 500’s Corporate Counsel 100.

Prior to joining StarHub, Veronica practised at Rajah and Tann for six years, specialising in corporate and commercial law.

Yanjun Wang
Group General Counsel
Garena Interactive Holding Limited
Yanjun Wang is the Group General Counsel of Garena Interactive Holding Limited, an internet and mobile platform company headquartered in Singapore with operations across Greater Southeast Asia, and established the group’s in-house legal function. Prior to joining Garena, she worked at the New York office of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP and the Hong Kong office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP, with a focus on U.S. and Hong Kong capital markets, M&A and general corporate matters.   

She received her Juris Doctor degree from Harvard Law School and Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Harvard University. 

Monique Villa
CEO
Thomson Reuters Foundation
Monique Villa is CEO of the Thomson Reuters Foundation and Founder of TrustLaw and Trust Women. She has been ranked among the world’s 100 most influential people in Business Ethics by Ethisphere. Since her appointment in 2008, she has transformed the Foundation, launching a number of programmes that leverage the expertise of Thomson Reuters to trigger change and empower people across the world. Among them; TrustLaw, the Foundation's global pro bono programme dedicated to spreading the practice of pro bono; and Trust Women, a fast-growing movement to empower women and to fight slavery worldwide. Under Villa, the Foundation also covers the world’s under reported stories, and offers training and media development to strengthen free media globally.

Ranajit Dam
Managing Editor
Asian Legal Business - Thomson Reuters
Ranajit Dam is the Managing Editor of Thomson Reuters’ Legal Media Group, which includes Asian Legal Business, Asia’s foremost monthly publication covering the legal industry. A former lawyer, he has been a journalist for more than a decade, after graduating from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism. Since then, he has worked in China, India and Singapore, where he is currently based.

Chris Lee
Legal Counsel
Haw Par Corporation Limited