Demarest announces two new partners for its Energy practice

Demarest Advogados announced the hiring of Henrique Reis (pictured left) and Maria Beatriz Grella Vieira (pictured right) as new partners to strengthen its Energy practice area, with a focus on Regulatory and M&A/Corporate Law, respectively.

With 15 years of experience in matters related to regulation in the electricity sector, Henrique advises domestic and international clients on complex regulatory and contractual issues, in addition to structuring business models in the energy generation, distribution, transmission and commercialization segments, including auctions, free market, self-production and distributed generation. He also works on strategic matters of business groups before regulatory and planning bodies, such as Aneel (National Electric Energy Agency) and the Ministry of Mines and Energy, as well as in judicial litigation.
Henrique holds a LL.M. in Business Law from FGV (Fundação Getulio Vargas), a Law degree from UFV (Federal University of Viçosa) and is in course for an MBA in Finance from Ibmec (Brazilian Institute of Capital Markets).
Maria Beatriz has worked for 17 years in the areas of Corporate Law and Mergers and Acquisitions, the last 8 of which focused on the electricity sector, advising companies (retailers, generators, transmission companies and investors) on M&A transactions, corporate and contractual matters, in addition to working on the structuring of self-generation and distributed energy generation projects.
The new partner holds a law degree from Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie and a postgraduate degree in Business Administration from FGV, with one of the stages of her specialization course being completed at the University of Cologne, Germany. At the beginning of her career, while still a student, Maria Beatriz did her first internship at Demarest.
Along with the two new partners, four associates specialized in the energy sector join the firm. They are Luana Ferraz, Louise West, William Mendes and Arthur Plotz.
Henrique will be based in Belo Horizonte with Arthur, a regulatory lawyer, while Maria Beatriz will work in the São Paulo office with Luana and Louise, transactional lawyers, and William, on regulatory matters.
With the arrival of Henrique and Maria Beatriz, Demarest now has 98 partners working in more than 50 areas of law to serve more than 1,500 clients in Brazil and abroad.