Demarest Advogados, based in São Paulo, has reinforced its environmental and competition law teams, welcoming a former associate and a lateral hire from a competing firm.
Paula Salles spent seven years as an associate at Mattos Filho Veiga Filho Marrey Jr. & Quiroga Advogados before joining Demarest’s competition team as a junior partner. She advises clients within and outside of Brazil's borders on administrative proceedings related to anticompetitive conduct, and on the clearance of corporate operations with Brazilian antitrust authorities. Salles got her LL.M. degree at University of Pennsylvania Law School and obtained a certificate in Business Administration from Wharton Business School. She worked as an international associate at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton in Washington from August 2012 to April 2013.
Fernanda Harari recently came aboard as an associate from Pereira Neto Macedo Advogados to work alongside Salles.
According to Salles, companies are operating in Brazil amid increasingly strict antitrust enforcement and anti-corruption policies.
“This will lead to an increase in the number of investigations and in the demand for preventive remedies and compliance programs by Brazilian companies and international companies that operate in Brazil,” she said.
Lourdes de Alcantara Machado returns to Demarest as a junior partner and member of the environmental practice area, seven years after she left the firm to work as a specialist in environmental law issues at JBS. She took part in several projects as an independent consultant doing environmental audits, legal analyses of the changes wrought by the Brazilian New Forest Code, administrative appeals, and defense of infraction penalties levied by environmental agencies, as well as advising on environmental licensing of renewable energy projects.
Machado says her experience in the private sector has taught her skills that she believes will be essential to tackling clients’ environmental issues.
“I will be able to add a level of knowledge of a company´s internal structure and the multiple scales of engagement that are required to tackle different environmental matters,” she said. “I expect that this experience will contribute to increase the ability of Demarest´s environmental practice in identifying innovative solutions to the environmental problems that our clients may face, as well as to negotiate and implement those solutions.”
Machado added that in the environmental area, a multidisciplinary approach is crucial.
“Those years of experience in the meat, leather, energy and food sectors of JBS’ activities has raised my knowledge of technical aspects that are crucial to allow for effective negotiations involving different stakeholders, both within the internal structure of the company where almost all of my activities involved different departments of each company, as well as the board of directors and external entities such as the public ministry, supply chain, NGOs, and consumers,” she said.
Machado earned an LL.M. degree and a J.D. degree in Environmental Law from Berkeley Law School. She is a sitting member of the Associate Board of the Department of the Environment of the Federation of Industries of the State of São Paulo.
