JUDGING PANEL 

Each year, ALB invites an independent judging panel of senior and expert legal industry leaders from various sectors corresponding to the diverse list of award categories. ALB is pleased to introduce some of the distinguished judges. The rest of the panel will be revealed on the evening of the awards.

Beatrix R. Guevarra
Legal Director, DKSH Philippines, Inc. 

Atty. Beatrix Guevarra is currently the Legal Director of DKSH Philippines, Inc., (member of the DKSH Group), a market expansion services provider for companies who want to grow their business in the areas of healthcare, performance materials and technology.  She leads the DKSH Philippines legal team which serves all the DKSH entities in the Philippines. 
Prior to joining DKSH, she was the Country Legal and Compliance Head of the Bollore Group in the Philippines. She also served as Senior Legal Counsel of Holcim Philippines, Inc. for almost 6 years. She started her career in Ponce Enrile Reyes & Manalastas immediately after she was admitted to the bar.

Camille Aromas
General Counsel, Huawei Technologies

Camille Aromas is the General Counsel of Huawei Technologies in the Philippines. She graduated from the University of the Philippines College of Law and received her Master of Laws from Queen Mary University of London under a Chevening scholarship. Prior to Huawei, Camille worked as a governance consultant at the Asian Development Bank and in top tier law firms in the Philippines and in London as a dispute resolution specialist. 

Fernando S. Penarroyo
Chairperson, Professional Regulatory Board of Geology
Professional Regulation Commission

FERNANDO S. PEÑARROYO is currently the Chairperson, Professional Regulatory Board of Geology at Professional Regulation Commission. He is also the Managing Partner at the Peñarroyo and Palanca Law Offices. He was the former Group Legal Counsel and General Manager for Busi-ness Development of Polyard Petroleum International Group Co. Ltd. He practices in the area of energy, resources, environment, infrastructure, and corporate law and possesses the required legal, financial, and technical educational background and experience having worked for the government (Department of Energy) and private sector, both locally and internationally (Australia). 
 
He is the former President of the Geological Society of the Philippines, current Vice President of the Philippine Mining and Exploration Association, and former Director of the International Geothermal Association. His commentaries are also archived at his personal blog site - https://penarroyo.com/.

Jhimmy Portugal Santiago
General Counsel, Light Rail Manila Corporation

Atty. Santiago is the General Counsel for Light Rail Manila Corporation, the private concessionaire operating the Light Rail Transit Line-1 system. Prior to holding this position, he was the Governance and Compliance Head of LRMC. Before joining LRMC, he was a partner for Litigation and Labor of the Carag Zaballero San Pablo and Abiera Law Office. He obtained his Bachelor of Arts Degree in Management Economics from the Ateneo De Manila University in 2001 and his Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of the Philippines in 2006.

He is also an Investigating Commissioner of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines Commission on Bar Discipline.

Lirene C. Mora
Director | Head of Global Corporate Legal Affairs

Lirene is ICTSI’s Director for Global Corporate Legal Affairs. She joined ICTSI in 2007 as Industrial Relations Officer and has since held several positions in the Legal Department, including Regional Counsel for Asia Pacific.

Lirene has been elected as a Director in ICTSI subsidiaries in Papua New Guinea – Motukea International Container Terminal Ltd. and South Pacific International Container Terminal. Concurrently, she is a Director of Bauan International Port, Inc., Laguna Gateway Inland Container Terminal, Inc.  and South Cotabato Integrated Port Services, Inc.; a Director and Corporate Secretary of Abbotsford Holdings, Inc., IW Cargo Handlers, Inc. Manila Harbor Center Port Services, Inc.; a Corporate Secretary of Catalyst Logistics Incorporated, Sevilla Brokerage Incorporated, Intermodal Terminal Holdings, Inc., IWI Container Terminal Holdings, Inc.; and Assistant Corporate Secretary of ICTSI Subic, Inc., Subic Bay International Terminal Corporation and Subic Bay International Terminal Holdings, Inc. Lirene is also the Corporate Secretary of ICTSI Foundation, Inc.

She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy (Summa Cum Laude) from the College of Social Sciences & Philosophy and Juris Doctor degree from the College of Law of the University of the Philippines, Diliman. Lirene was recognized as the 2019 Woman Lawyer of the Year and a finalist for the 2019 Young Lawyer of the Year by the Asian Legal Business Philippine Law Awards. In 2023, Lirene received recognition from The Legal 500 as she was selected to be part of the inaugural General Counsel Powerlist Philippines.

Maria Lourdes P. Lim
Tax Managing Partner, PwC Philippines

Malou leads the tax practice of the Philippine office. She has more than 26 years of professional and extensive experience in providing tax services for various multinational and local companies of different industries such as Financial Services, Real Estate, Consumer & Industrial Products and Services (CIPS), Business Process Outsourcing, Energy, Oil & Gas.

Her core experience includes corporate structuring and taxation, with emphasis on in-bound and out-bound investment planning; crossborder acquisitions; advisory on the application and interpretation of domestic laws on tax, investment, corporate and securities regulations; restructuring/reorganization; mergers & acquisitions; tax due diligence/tax health check review; tax assessments and refund claims.

From April 2001 to December 2002, Malou joined the government upon invitation of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue as Technical Consultant for Legal and Operations.

Prior to joining the firm, her other professional experience includes working as an accountant and as a financial analyst.

Maria Rowena Espiritu    
Contract Manager, Blount County Government, Tennessee, USA

Maria Rowena Espiritu had been an in-house lawyer for multinational and domestic companies in the Philippines for almost two decades. She was Philippine Country Counsel and Data Protection Officer of IBM Philippines, Incorporated and its related companies before migrating to the US in early 2022. She is now the Contract Manager for Blount County Government in Tennessee, USA.
 
Prior to IBM and Blount County Government, Espiritu was the Legal Affairs Director of Huawei Technologies Phils. for almost five years. She has also been a Resident Agent and Legal Counsel of VEECO APAC, INC. (Philippine Branch) Legal Manager of Directories Philippines Corporation; Assistant Corporate Secretary of Asian Terminals Inc. in previous years.
 
Espiritu holds a Postgraduate Diploma (With Merit) in Technology, Media, and Telecommunications Law from Queen Mary University of London (United Kingdom). She also finished various certification courses by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Academy (Switzerland), namely Advance Course on Electronic Commerce and Intellectual Property, Advance Course on Copyright and Related Rights and Advance Course on Arbitration and Mediation Procedure. 

Mark Enojo
Head of Compliance - ASEAN, Siemens Healthineers
 
Mark Enojo is the Head of Compliance in ASEAN of Siemens Healthineers, a leading publicly listed medical technology company headquartered in Germany.  In this role, he oversees the ASEAN countries and acts as a partner to the business in risk management in the key compliance areas of anti-bribery and corruption, data privacy, anti-trust and competition, and anti-money laundering.  He also serves as the Head of Legal and Compliance and as Data Protection Officer in the Philippines. He started his career in various law firms: Ponce Enrile Reyes & Manalastas in the Philippines and the Vietnam offices of Kelvin Chia Partnership and Mayer Brown, mainly focusing on M&A and corporate law.  Prior to working for Siemens Healthineers, he was with the business process outsourcing sector through RR Donnelley and then SPi Global (now, Straive). 

Mary Rose S. Tan
AVP-Associate General Counsel, San Miguel Corporation

Atty. Mary Rose S. Tan is the Assistant Corporate Secretary and AVP-Associate General Counsel of San Miguel Corporation. She has been teaching at the UP College of Law since November 2009. Among the subjects she has been teaching are Obligations and Contracts, Succession, and Torts and Damages. She is also team teaching Cross Border Securities Regulation at the UP Law Master of Laws program.  She also conducts MCLE lectures on Philippine Contract Law, and holds bar review lectures on Civil Law subjects for the UP Law Center Bar Review Institute. Prior to joining San Miguel Corporation. Atty. Tan was a Court Attorney at the Office of the Chief Justice – Supreme Court of the Philippines, and an associate at SyCip Salazar Hernandez & Gatmaitan. Atty. Tan obtained her Master of Laws degree from the University of Sydney in 2009 as an Endeavour Postgraduate Award scholar of the Australian Government. She was admitted to the Bar in 2002. She obtained her Bachelor of Laws degree in 2001 and her degree of BA Psychology from the University of the Philippines. She is currently a member of the Board of Trustees of the UP Women Lawyers Circle for 2022-2024. She is also Assistant Corporate Secretary of the UP Law Alumni Foundation.

Sharon T. Lim
Head of Legal & Compliance - COL Financial Group, Inc. 

Sharon is the Corporate Secretary and Head of Legal & Compliance of COL Financial Group, Inc., where she oversees the legal strategy and compliance program of the organization and its related companies namely CTS Global Equity Group, Inc., COL Equity Index Unitized Mutual Fund, Inc., COL Strategic Growth Equity Unitized Mutual Fund, Inc., and COL Investment Management, Inc. Sharon holds a Masters in Law (Corporate & Financial Services Law) from the National University of Singapore and a Bachelor of Laws from the University of the Philippines. She is also a licensed Associated Person and Certified Information Privacy Manager.
 

Teodoro Kalaw IV. C. Arb.
Chartered Arbitrator & President Emeritus, Philippine Institute of Arbitrators

Atty. Kalaw is the first and only Filipino to be installed as a Chartered Arbitrator as well as certified as an Accredited Mediator by the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (CIArb). As President Emeritus of the Philippine Institute of Arbitrators (PIArb), he is also among the youngest to be elected a Fellow of CIArb, PIArb, the Singapore Institute of Arbitrators (SIArb), the Hong Kong Institute of Arbitrators (HKIArb), and the Asian Institute of Alternative Dispute Resolution (AIADR).  A practicing attorney since 1998, he is a member of the bars of the Philippines, New York State, and the United States Supreme Court.

and many more...