Interview with: Lucas Arboleda, Director of the Energy & Natural Resources Practice

What do you see as the main points that differentiate DLA Piper Martínez Beltrán from your competitors?

DLA Piper Martínez Beltrán stands out in the market for embracing change, whether political or legal, helping our clients to find the best strategy and avoiding as much as possible any impact that the new circumstances may generate. The main thing is to identify the change and with great attention to detail and dedication we provide what the client is looking for and needs from a business point of view.

Clients look to the DLA Piper Martínez Beltrán team for the ability to seek and find the best path that will allow them to develop their business.

We have a team of lawyers with sufficient and outstanding experience to contribute all their knowledge to provide an efficient and quality service. Also, DLA Piper Latin America’s Team offers full-service business legal counsel to domestic and multinational companies with interests in and operations throughout the region. Our integrated approach to serving clients combines local knowledge with the resources of the DLA Piper global platform. With over 400 lawyers practicing throughout Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Mexico, Peru, and Puerto Rico, our teams frequently work with our professionals throughout the LatAm region, Iberian Peninsula, and around the globe to ensure our clients receive the depth of service they require to meet their legal and business objectives.

Which practices do you see growing in the next 12 months? What are the drivers behind that?

Despite the economic recovery we continue to have a high demand in labor, restructuring and insolvency matters, however we see that other practice areas are also in high demand. One that is worth highlighting is infrastructure, which will undoubtedly be part of the engines that will lead Colombia to recover from the ravages of the pandemic, however, all the firm’s practices will grow materially. In any event, the dispute resolution, corporate (M&A) and tax practices stand out.

Additionally, environmental law is a practice that will have a preponderant importance in the future because society is demanding it and the new government will have to continue to evolve along this path. Therefore, we started 2022 with the opening of this area in the firm and with the incorporation of María Camila del Villar as its director.

We are working on the largest projects, and we are also very active in large infrastructure projects in the country. Our client base has grown exponentially, thanks to our impeccable work and consequently the team is also growing because of the trust our clients place in us”.

What’s the main change you’ve made in the firm that will benefit clients?

The pandemic allowed us and accelerated the process of implementing changes that sought to benefit clients through alternatives and strategies that would work for the development of their businesses and avoid possible consequences.

One of the key changes that the firm has implemented is the use of technological platforms for the preparation of documents and the maintenance of document versions, allowing clients to have control of their information and of the negotiation stages involved. Additionally, we have adopted virtual meetings, whose main purpose today after the pandemic is to make meetings with clients more diligent, short, and concise, seeking maximum effectiveness in the client’s time.

The above has allowed us to develop internal policies, implement new technological tools and most importantly adapt to change for the benefit of all our clients.

Is technology changing the way you interact with your clients, and the services you can provide them?

Our clients’ expectations for service and responsiveness have changed significantly as technology has gotten more integrated into daily life and as society has become more fast-paced. We can see that new technology, including artificial intelligence and case management software, may eliminate or drastically reduce the number of pointless time-consuming chores. This frees up time that can be used to better serve and support clients. But in addition to freeing up hours, technology also makes it possible to improve client interactions and the customer experience.

In that regard, DLA Piper Martínez Beltrán is structuring and carrying out activities through its innovation under the direction of DLA Piper Global and in accordance with the invention and disruptive guidelines that characterize the DLA Piper brand globally.

Can you give us a practical example of how you have helped a client to add value to their business?

In DLA Piper Martínez Beltrán, we are constantly striving to find the best solution and strategy that allows the client to move forward and add value to their business; this will always be our goal. An example of our invaluable work is the project we are currently working on with Massy Energy Colombia S.A. for the merger of three LPG companies. The structure of this merger has never been done in Colombia, considering the specific regulatory issues that we had to tackle and the public and private entities that had to be convinced that the structure worked and complied with the applicable regulation.

To achieve this, we had to structure an innovative solution that implied a new interpretation of the applicable law which we had to demonstrate was more in line with the public policy issued by the Government. For that matter, we had to involve entities of the National Government, as well as Ecopetrol (the biggest oil and gas company in Colombia), the Regulatory Commission of Gas and Energy, and the Superintendence of Public Utilities, among others.

This case demonstrated that DLA Piper Martínez Beltrán is not only a conventional law firm but also a strategic ally for our clients, considering that our services include, among others, strategic advice and interaction with different actors of public and private nature to achieve results that go beyond mere legal advice.

Are clients looking for stability and strategic direction from their law firms – where do you see the firm in three years’ time?

We have experienced that our clients nowadays are looking for law firms to advise them not only on legal issues but rather for an integral counsel, which should include new business opportunities. In that sense, we believe that our law firm is already changing to provide our clients with a platform that could offer them not only legal services but also opportunities and alternatives to expand their business, which of course, should be complemented with innovative legal services.

In that sense, we believe it will be most important in the coming years to have a sophisticated technological platform where our clients can access all the potential opportunities identified by the law firm. This platform should include, for example, a project pipeline that could be attractive to our clients. Also, this tool should facilitate our clients to find opportunities not only among themselves but also with other agents for which strategic alliances could be made, for example, with investment banks and public entities.

In three years, we see DLA Piper Martínez Beltrán being the leader in the Colombian market in all practice areas, with exponential growth as we have been doing for more than two years, because we want to be not only legal advisors but also strategic allies.