About

Founded in 1834, Ayala Corporation is the Philippines’ oldest and largest conglomerate. Headed by managing director and general counsel Solomon M. Hermosura, Ayala’s legal team is comprised of 23 lawyers and 34 non-lawyers, but continues to grow to align with the company’s growth plans. The team structure is also based on the strategic business units of Ayala and practice groups to ensure all legal matters are handled effectively. Other key individuals in the legal department include deputy general counsel June Vee Monteclaro Navarro, head of litigation Roberto T. Ongsiako, head of tax Mildo Flor C. Sison, head of intellectual property Arlene B. Montero and head of regulatory Elner A. Reyes. Christian Gerard P. Castillo has also been highlighted as a key team member for serving in the capacity of head of banking, securities, and finance as well as chief legal officer of AC Industrials, a wholly owned subsidiary of Ayala Corporation. Whilst Castillo worked on AC Industrials’ 94.9% acquisition of German company MT Misslbeck Technologies in a transaction valued at €26.8m in 2017, many of the team’s other members worked on a number of substantive deals in the past 12 months. Some of these transactions include executing a US$400m senior unsecured and guaranteed fixed for life perpetual notes and agreeing a deal between Ayala Corporation, Ayala Land, BPI Capital Corporation and Kickstart Ventures to acquire ownership stakes in BF Jade E-Service Philippines, the owner and operator of online fashion platform Zalora Philippines. In a separate deal, the team were instrumental in the acquisition of Chevron’s geothermal assets and operations in Indonesia by AC Energy Holdings, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ayala Corporation, as part of an Indonesian consortium. The team gained particular recognition for also raising up to ₱20bn through retail bonds, corporate notes and bilateral term loans with the retail bonds being issued under the Corporation’s ₱50bn Debt Securities Program as well as raising up to ₱10bn through the issuance of short-dated notes with a tenor of up to 21 months to refinance the short-term loans. Summing up the team ethos, Hermosura says, ‘our vision statement is grounded on the legal group being part of the collective mind of the business units that we service. We believe that a legal group should provide timely, responsive, effective and quality business-oriented legal counselling and services’.