Impressions

Viviane Adélaïde Reding
Former Vice President and three-term European Commissioner, former Member of the European Parliament

Viviane Reding is one of the most prominent personalities of Europe. She completed 3 terms as member of the European Government and became first Vice President and EU Commissioner responsible for Justice, Fundamental rights and Citizenship in 2010. Following her victory in the European elections in May 2014 she was Member of the European Parliament from Luxembourg until September 2018.

In 1999, having served 10 years in the Luxembourg Parliament and 10 years in the European Parliament, she became EU Commissioner for Education, Culture, Youth and Sport.  In 2004 she became EU Commissioner for Information Society and Media where she was instrumental in the reform of the European telecom sector, opening the internal market to competition.

Philippe Lamberts
Member of the European Parliament, Co-Chair –Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance

Philippe Lamberts was born in 1963 in Brussels, Belgium. He studied Engineering in applied mathematics, at the Catholic University of Louvain. From 1987 to 2009, he worked at IBM in various business positions. He was elected in June 2009 for a first term in the European Parliament. In May 2014, he was re-elected for a second term and appointed Co-President of the Green group in the European Parliament.

His political career within the Belgian green party (Ecolo) started in 1991, where he served both at the local and federal levels.  As of 1999, he became more and more involved with European politics, and more specifically through the European Green Party (former European Federation of Green Parties), of which he has been the co-president from 2006 to 2012.

As Member of the European Parliament, he focuses on economic and financial questions, and has become a specialist on fiscal, banking and macroeconomic issues.

Philippe Lamberts is currently co-chair of the Greens/EFA political group with Ska Keller. He aims to reinforce the Greens both within and outside the EU institutions, and with civil society, and to continue his work on the financial regulation and social justice front.

He is running for European elections in May 2019 for Ecolo in Belgium together with Saskia Bricmont.

Gabriella Dore
Executive Vice President & General Counsel Europe and Africa – FOX Networks Group

Gabriella Dore is the Executive Vice President and General Counsel Europe and Africa for FOX Networks Group. As such, she oversees the company’s legal affairs in the Europe and Africa regions, handles the regulatory and compliance side of the business and manages a team of 32 lawyers and paralegals.

Gabriella has over 23 years of professional experience in the areas of media, intellectual property and telecommunications law with emphasis on compliance, corporate and regulatory affairs.  She has spent over 14 years building FNG’s Europe and Africa’s legal team from the ground up and has herself developed from General Counsel for Europe to a Global General Counsel of Legal, Compliance and Regulatory Affairs, reporting directly to the President, CEO and Board of Directors of the company.

Among her responsibilities falls also the legal and compliance supervision of FNG Turkey’s FTA business (which in 2014 was combined with the pay-TV) and currently consists of over 450 employees executing hefty operations and EMM (Dutch JV between FNG and the Dutch Soccer Premiere League). Prior to joining FNG in 2004, Gabriella spent 4 years as the Head of Legal at Netesi Spa and the Head of Legal at Avaya Lucent Italia Spa respectively. In both telecommunication entities she handled complicated litigation and corporate affair matters, oversaw the entire regulatory affairs side of the business and handled negotiations with high-end operators and clients. She has gained the foundation of her litigation and corporate affair experience as an attorney at a traditional Italian law firm with a practice focused on corporate law and civil law.

Gabriella earned her law degree from the University of Rome (La Sapienza) with a post-degree specialization in civil and contractual law, and subsequently gained a Master’s degree in copyright and intellectual property in Milan.

Gabriella has gained extensive academic experience in the last 10 years by teaching trademark and IP law courses and seminars both in Rome and Milan.

In 2018 Gabriella and her team won the General Commercial team award at the European Counsel Awards division of the Global Counsel Awards in London.

Aminata Kaké
Member of the Management Board, General Counsel & Secretary General – Befimmo

Ms. Aminata Kaké is the General Counsel and a Member of the Management Committee of Befimmo SA, a Real Estate Investment Trust based in Belgium and listed on Euronext. Among other activities, Ms. Kaké is also Non-Executive Director of the Belgian Association of Listed Companies, Member of the Advisory Council of EuropeanIssuers, Member of the European Real Estate Public Association, Member of the European Risk Management Association, Member of the Belgian Institute of Directors, Member of the Institute of Company Lawyers and Non-Executive Director of the nonprofit organization Hu-Man. Previously, Ms. Kaké was Deputy General Counsel for the financial holding company Dexia SA, with global responsibilities (overseeing Belgium, France, Luxembourg, UK, US and Turkey). Ms. Kaké holds a Master of Laws from the Free University of Brussels (ULB), a Master in Real Estate from the Solvay Brussels School of Economics & Management, a Postgraduate Certificate in Business Administration and in a Postgraduate Certificate from the Brussels School of Cognitive Technology and Law.

Fergus McReynolds
Director of EU Affairs, Make UK

Fergus McReynolds represents Make UK, the manufacturers’ organisation in Brussels, leading Make UK’s engagement and liaising with the European institutions and stakeholders on a wide range of European policies. Working through his extensive European network with the UK Government, the EU Commission, the European Parliament and our European partner organisations, including Ceemet, Fergus has represented manufacturers across Europe for over 5 years.

Fergus ensures that manufacturers have a strong voice when it comes to the formation of European policies. In close collaboration with Make UK’s team in London, he follows the European legislative programme and provides advice and guidance on political developments in the EU. Fergus’s work on Brexit helps to develop Make UK’s strategy and feeds key recommendations into governments and stakeholders at all levels.

Fergus has a Masters in Chemistry from the University of Warwick and joined Make UK as a Senior Climate & Environment Policy Adviser. Before joining, he worked in the food industry providing guidance and analysis for dairy companies. He was instrumental in setting up the environmental target setting project, the Dairy Roadmap, in the UK. Fergus has since sat on various government and industry advisory panels in the UK and abroad. In the past, he spent six months on secondment in the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Andreas Mestel
General Counsel EMEA, ALLNEX

Andreas Mestel is General Counsel EMEA at allnex, a leading producer of coating resins. Prior to joining allnex in 2007, he held various legal positions in the German Chemical Industry Association “VCI” in Frankfurt, Colipa (today Cosmetics Europe) in Brussels and the law firm Arnecke Siebold (today Arnecke Sibeth Dabelstein) in Frankfurt.  Andreas is in charge of managing legal matters within the EMEA-region across all legal areas and headed the recent project to enhance the digitalization of allnex’ legal department. Andreas graduated in Saarbrücken and Berlin and holds a postgraduation degree in European and International Law from the European Institute of the Saarland University. Andreas was admitted to the Frankfurt Bar and is member of the Belgian inhouse counsel institute IJB/IBJ.

John Engholm

General Counsel, Serendipity Group AB
Founder, InsiderLog

Marc Beyens
President of the Federal Institute of Company Lawyers (IJE/IBJ) of Belgium
General Counsel Energy Belgium-Lux. – Engie Electrabel

Marc Beyens is the President of the Federal Institute of Company Lawyers (IJE/IBJ) of Belgium and the General Counsel Energy in the BeLux region for ENGIE Electrabel since 2016. Marc is an expert in the nuclear energy sector, having served as a board member and chairman at numerous energy-related associations, organisations and companies. Most recently, he became a board member for Tecnubel and Transnubel and has been a Member of the Board of the Supervisory Committee for the Belgian Nuclear Forum since 2009.

Marc has been working in the ENGIE Group since 1988. He has also worked as a judge in the Commercial Court of Brussels and as a general counsel in the Belgian Textile – Clothing Federation.

Aiga Senftleben
General Counsel/Co-Founder – Billie

Aiga Senftleben co-founded Billie GmbH in 2016 and is Billie’s General Counsel since. Billie is a fintech start-up, specialised in providing factoring and online-payment services to SMEs. Previously she has been General Counsel for Funding Circle Europe, a P2P lending platform. She is a trained lawyer and solicitor, having worked for Dentons LLP as well as PayPal. 

Volker Weisshaar
General Counsel & Member Management Board – EMEA – Sonos, Inc.

Volker Weisshaar has over 20 years of experience in international legal work in Europe and in the US, most recently as General Counsel for Sonos Europe, a global manufacturer of wireless HiFi systems. He spent most of his career as counsel for the high-tech and communication industry, at large public companies as well as at start-ups. From 2002 until 2011 as General Counsel EMEA at NetApp, a global Fortune 500 company, providing data storage and management systems. Prior to NetApp Volker held various legal, management, compliance and regulatory positions in the telecommunication industry in Europe.

Volker holds a law degree from Albert-Ludwigs-Universität in Freiburg, where he specialized in international and intellectual property law. He is admitted to practice law in Germany.

Diane Bacquet-Herbaux
Chief Labour and Employment Counsel EMEA, Honeywell

Diane is responsible for providing labor and employment advice to all Honeywell activities across Europe, Middle East and Africa. She is regularly involved in transactional  projects for all businesses and she supports M&A due-dilligence processes as well as the Human Resources and Labour & Employee Relations team for all matters related to Honeywell European Works Council, unions and local works councils.

Prior to joining Honeywell in 2010, Diane had similar responsibilities for GE Healthcare for 4 years and for international Law firms in Paris and Argentina.

Diane is graduated in International Business Law from the Paris University and is a qualified French attorney.

Alexis De Vliegher
Assistant General Counsel, Solar Turbines Europe S.A.

Alexis De Vliegher has 18 years of general commercial legal experience across Europe, Africa, the Middle East and India. Since 2010 he has built, developed and managed a team of 6, that includes attorneys, paralegals and an administrative assistant in India and a team of 6 in the Benelux region. Since 2018, he has been working as the Assistant General Counsel at Solar Turbines, a wholly owned subsidiary of Caterpillar Inc. Alexis has extensive experience in project management, European Public Procurement Projects, contract negotiations and compliance, amongst others. He has obtained a Master in European in International Law and a Master in Law from VUB Brussels.

Barbara Speranza
General Counsel – Soundreef

Barbara Speranza is Soundreef media Service Srl’s Head of Legal. In this role, she oversees Soundreef’s global legal activities and policies, as well as compliance and regulatory affairs. Previously she was Senior Counsel Operations Italy & Spain in a Global Fortune 500 US chemical company. She is a member of the Italian association of company lawyers (AIGI) and of the Licensing Executive Society Italy (LES Italy), in whose Board of Directors she sat from 2008 to 2011. Barbara is an Italian licensed attorney since 2004, she has a Ph.D. in European Comparative Studies, a LLM in Intellectual Property and she is currently attending an EMBA at the Business School of the University of Turin.

Alejandro Carballo Leyda
General Counsel and Head of the Conflict Resolution Centre – Energy Charter Secretariat

Alejandro Carballo is the current General Counsel and head of the Conflict Resolution Centre at the Energy Charter Secretariat (which provides good offices and mediation support to investors and governments). He is also in charge of the discussion on modernisation of the Energy Charter Treaty and provides support to governments for implementing their instrument for managing investment disputes. Previously, Alejandro advised states and private clients on a wide range of public and private international law issues. He participated in the working groups of UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts and the Hague Conference Principles on Choice of Law in international contracts.

Elona Ganaj
General Counsel and Company Secretary – Play Communications S.A.

Elona Ganaj was appointed Group General Counsel and Company Secretary of Play Communications S.A., a Luxembourgish entity regulated by Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financière and listed in Warsaw Stock Exchange, in January 2018. Play Communications S.A. is the holding company for Play Group. Its subsidiary P4 Sp. z o.o. operates under the brand PLAY – one of the fastest growing European mobile operators, an exceptional “success story”, the largest mobile network operator in Poland with a differentiating subscriber growth trajectory with over 15.2 million subscribers.  Under the current role, Mrs. Ganaj is responsible for handling all corporate and commercial matters, supporting investments, business negotiations and M&A transactions.

Mrs. Ganaj previously worked for 10 years with Vodafone, with the last six years as Head of Legal in Vodafone Albania. In parallel she also served as Head of Legal for Vodafone M-Pesa, an electronic money institution subsidiary of Vodafone Albania part of M-Pesa, the world leading mobile money service provided by Vodafone.  Before joining Vodafone, Mrs. Ganaj was a consultant for International Finance Corporation, member of World B

Marijn van Houtum
Director and General Counsel EMEA – ASICS EMEA

As Director and General Counsel at ASICS for the EMEA region, Marijn has deep experience in the commercial dynamics and legal aspects of the various distribution strategies for consumer goods and retail businesses which includes online and platform sales and the wider digital agenda. Marijn is part of the EMEA management team and a regular speaker on distribution strategy challenges as well as the management of successful teams.

Nemio Passalacqua
General Counsel Europe – Petronas Lubricants Italy S.p.A.

Nemio is a qualified lawyer in Italy with a LLM in International Business Law. After an experience of 5 years in the Corporate/M&A department of an Italian business law firm (Gianni, Origoni, Grippo, Cappelli & Partners), in 2011 he joined the holding company of Ferrero Group in Luxemburg dealing with corporate matter, corporate governance as well as contracts. In 2013 he moved to Ferrero Italy in the industrial, operating supply legal department which he started to lead from 2016 together with the corporate department. Starting from September 2018 he joined Petronas Lubricants as General Counsel Europe.

Nemio is member of AIGI (Associazione Italiana Giuristi di Impresa): from 2016 he is the responsible for the north west Italian area and from April 2019 he is also member of the board of AIGI.

Antonio Papalino
Senior Legal Counsel – L’Oréal Italia

Antonio is legal manager at L’Oréal Group in Italy, where he coordinates the Real Estate and Antitrust teams.
He regularly provides the legal assistance to both the holding and its subsidiaries, advising the company in Italian and European Antitrust law, Corporate Law, IP Law and Real Estate Law.
Prior to working with L’Oréal, he was a commercial and corporate legal counsel at the Carrefour Group.

Former student at Collegio Europeo di Parma, he is an italian qualified lawyer and a member of AIGI , the Italian in-house counsel association.

George Janssen
Chief Legal Officer – Blancco Technology Group

George is working as the Global Head of the Blancco Legal Department. His array of responsibilities at Blancco include data privacy and GDPR, M&A, compliance, corporate housekeeping, sales & procurement risk review and data analysis. Previously, George worked as the Legal Manager for Accenture, acting as the country manager for the Transaction Contracting Team of the Netherlands. He was also responsible for the EU and Netherlands data privacy & data security and issues concerning privacy regulations and cyber security.

George has studied at the Erasmus University Rotterdam, the Yamasa Institute in Okazaki and the Technical University Delft. Fluent in Dutch and English and proficient in 4 additional languages, including Japanese and Chinese Mandarin, George is also interested in political developments across the World and physical activities.

Carl Leeman
Chief Risk Officer, Katoen Natie International s.a.

Carl Leeman is the Chief Risk Officer at Katoen Natie. Katoen Natie is operating on a worldwide level as a logistic and engineering supplier to the automotive, petrochemical, consumer goods, retail and food industry, covering 28 countries in Europe, North America, South America, Asia, and Africa. Worldwide, Katoen Natie employs some 14.000 people. Carl Leeman is in charge of Risk Management within the Katoen Natie group of companies, covering more than 180 legal entities. His responsibilities are amongst others operational contracts, legal issues, claim handling, safety, security, insurance, and environmental management.

In addition, Carl is the chair of the board of the captive reinsurer Global Ré. He is also a board member of Katoen Natie International S.A., vice president of Belrim (Belgian Risk Management Association), the previous board member of FERMA (European Risk Management Association) and in the past was the President and Executive Chairman of IFRIMA (International Federation of Risk Management Associations). He has written a number of articles in different publications, newspapers and magazines and has given speeches at national and international conferences, in addition to teaching in several Risk Management and Crisis Management programs. He Studied at the Nautical College in Antwerp, and holds degrees in Risk Management, Marketing, Forwarding and Insurance Brokering.

Dr. Friedrich Popp
Senior Associate, Debevoise & Plimpton

Dr. Friedrich Popp is a senior associate in the Debevoise & Plimpton Frankfurt office and a member of the firm’s Litigation Department.

His practice focuses on arbitration, litigation, internal investigations, corporate law, data protection and anti-money laundering.  In addition, he is experienced in Mergers & Acquisitions, private equity, banking and capital markets and has published various articles on banking law.

Friedrich is a frequent speaker on national and international events and a regular author for trade- and public press.

Dr. Popp is a member of the Bar Associations of Vienna, Frankfurt am Main and New York.

Robert Maddox
Senior Associate, Debevoise & Plimpton

Robert Maddox is a senior associate in Debevoise & Plimpton LLP’s Cybersecurity & Data Privacy practice and White Collar & Regulatory Defense Group.

He has particular expertise on the impact of the GDPR on international dispute resolution and is a member of the ICCA-IBA Joint Task Force on Data Protection in International Arbitration Proceedings and sits on the London Court of International Arbitration’s GDPR Working Group.

Robert also presents and writes frequently on cybersecurity and data protection, having recently been published in the Global Data Review and presented on the FT Non Executive Director Programme.

Robert Maddox is admitted as a solicitor of the Senior Courts of England and Wales.

Koen Van de Casteele
Head of Unit, State Aid Policy and Case Support, DG COM, European Commission

Koen Van de Casteele is currently in charge of State Aid Policy and Case Support.  In that capacity, he has followed the implementation of State Aid Modernisation.  He has extensive experience in State aid control.

He started his career in the European Commission in DG Agriculture in the area of agricultural competition law in 1998

Prior to his work at the Commission, he was a senior associate in the Business and Finance Department of a major law firm in Brussels and London.

Koen Van de Casteele has read law at Leuven University (1986-1991), the College of Europe (1991-1992) and the University of Michigan Law School (1995-1996).

Ralph Vonderstein
Managing Director and Head of Legal Software – Wolters Kluwer Deutschland GmbH

Ralph Vonderstein has held various positions at Wolters Kluwer since October 1st 2002 and is currently responsible for the business with software solutions for law firms, notaries and corporate lawyers.

With more than 25 years of industry experience, he is a highly sought-after speaker and expert when it comes to the digitalization of business processes and the optimization of organizational structures. In his function, he is a key driver of technical innovations in the German legal market.

He is also one of the founding fathers of the Software Industry Association for Electronic Legal Transactions (SIV-ERV e.V.) and is involved in numerous committees, including the Bucerius Law School, the Soldan Institute and the European Legal Technology Association (ELTA).

Mareike Petrowitsch
General Counsel, Lesson Nine GmbH

Mareike has a passion to build legal departments that meet cutting-edge business needs by engaging new and evolving understandings of modern, purpose-driven and sustainable lawyering. With close to a decade of leadership experiences and being part of generation Y/millennial herself, she also knows and understands the challenges of (young) demanding managers and employees as well as change management needs in regards of digitization.

Mareike has been working in the tech start-up scene in Berlin since 2013. After being part of an epic start-up journey at Delivery Hero, Mareike joined Babbel, one of the world’s leading language learning apps, in 2016. As Babbel’s General Counsel, she currently supervises a staff of eight. She started her legal career in a mid-sized law firm and in more traditional legal departments of big (global) companies, including Bertelsmann and Helios. Mareike is a fully-qualified lawyer and attorney-at-law in Germany with an LL.M. from the CWSL in San Diego. She is a member of the German Bar Association and the Inhouse Lawyer Association. In 2013, Mareike qualified as a certified mediator in Germany. She is specialized in corporate & trade law as well as labor law and ADR.

Tom De Cordier
Partner, CMS

Tom is a seasoned data & technology lawyer with a strong focus on data privacy law, technology-related IP, technology, media and communications law, and life sciences. Clients praise him for his commercial acumen and his pragmatic and down-to-earth style. His practice covers a wide range of advisory, transactional and litigation work in international and domestic matters relating to data privacy, TMC and life sciences.  Tom has experience in various fields, ranging from digital transformation projects to data protection to e-commerce to telecom transactional work to life sciences.

Tom is ranked tier 1 in Legal 500’s latest shortlist of leading practitioners in EU data protection. He is ranked also as a “next generation lawyer” for IT and telecoms.

Tom frequently speaks at conferences and seminars on technology-related and digital law topics.  He is also frequently asked by the press to share his views on recent trends and developments in this area. For example, Tom was recently cited by Bloomberg in an article about “Fiat Chief’s Death Raises Privacy Questions”.

Before joining CMS Tom worked at Allen & Overy where he started his career in October 2000, was then promoted to senior associate in May 2007 and to counsel in May 2011.

Tom obtained his law degree from the University of Ghent in 1999.   As part of the Erasmus exchange program Tom studied in Paris (Paris X Nanterre) in 1999.  After graduating from Universiteit Gent Tom obtained a LL.M degree in Computers & Communications law from London University (2000).

Nicole Cambré
Vice President Legal, Radisson Hotel Group

Nicole Cambré is Radisson Hotel Group’s vice president legal and supports business development for the new hotel leases and management agreements in Europe, Middle East & Africa. In addition she oversees the Eastern Europe lawyer in Moscow and has legal area responsibility for the group’s hotel operations in Africa (and more recently also for the Middle East). She has extensive experience in managing owner and government disputes which from time to time escalate to a crisis situation.

Nicole was one of the four members of the crisis response team that traveled to Mali following the terrorist attack on Radisson’s hotel in Bamako in November 2015 during which 20 people were killed. She is also currently on the group’s crisis team and has extensive hands-on experience in dealing on the ground with crisis situations in various countries.

Prior to joining Radisson Hotel Group, Nicole served as general counsel Europe for Calgon Carbon , head of legal Europe for Staples and senior counsel Europe for International Paper. Also in her previous roles she managed various crisis situations.

Nicole is a dual German/Belgian citizen with a law degree from the University of Antwerp (Belgium) and holds a Master Degree in International Law and Human Rights from the University of Lund ( Sweden) and a Master Degree in European Economics from University College Dublin (Ireland).  In her spare time, Nicole loves to travel the world and she is a published and awarded photographer.