About

Ines Bahachille is the current vice president and assistant general counsel for Diageo West Latin America, with a remit that extends to 44 countries and several different business units and offices in relevant countries. Bahachille also leads Diageo’s Brand Protection team in the region, which is tasked with ‘making successful market and judicial interventions on behalf of [the company’s] brands’, an important function considering the very significant consequences counterfeit alcoholic beverages can entail. Arriving at Diageo when there was no established legal function in the region, Bahachille created legal teams from scratch in each necessary market, covering legal, corporate security, brand protection and compliance functions. Despite being based in Miami, a large bulk of Bahachille’s work in the past year was spent interacting with the Argentinean market, in particular regarding the sale of wine assets in the country that were completed over a record period of time and involved several parties. As well as negotiating with a respected and private local group for the sale of these assets, Bahachille was important in dealing with a number of related matters surrounding the exclusive import and export agreements surrounding the wine brands, a significant achievement given the complexity and scale of the transaction. Necessary in order to safeguard the reputation and revenue of Diageo, Bahachille also has the important responsibility of setting up strategies against counterfeits and leading investigations. Her skills are recognised by internal clients within the company; she received recognition when her team was voted as one of the top two legal departments in the entire Diageo business according to the results of a worldwide internal company survey.