“A leader can come from anywhere, but the wisest of them are lawyers.” This is no dogma or doctrine, but a fact we can all agree on. Leaders, coming from legal backgrounds, have shown multiple examples of dispensing ‘Practical Wisdom,’ making them ‘Practical Visionaries.’ They are not adjudged by where they advise but where they decide to make a change. Putting it in another way, they are driving the concept of ‘Lawyers as leaders.’ In this issue, “Influential Business Leaders of the Year 2021,” we proudly feature Atty. Nilo T. Divina, Managing partner of DivinaLaw. His zeal for law and extensive experience in various practice areas has led to his firm’s booming in a brief span, cultivating it as one of the Philippines’ leading law firms.
Be it leadership or legal practice, Nilo T. Divina is a virtuoso of both. He is a seasoned corporate and banking lawyer with over 3 decades of experience. Nilo was the Executive Vice President, General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary of one of the leading banks in the country. Nilo is equally engaged in various roles in academia. He is the Dean of the Faculty of Civil Law at the University of Santo Tomas (UST) since 2009 and teaches at the University of the Philippines College of Law. Nilo is also the former president and chairman of the Philippine Association of Law Schools. He has authored five books in Commercial Law that are primary resource material for law students and lawyers alike.
In 2006, he ideated DivinaLaw to give his experience and expertise a lucrative shape. Initially, he envisaged it as a boutique law firm, practising in select areas of law and would supplement his income. But one thing led to another, and opportunities arose one after the other, and DivinaLaw morphed into a full-service law firm before he realised it. Over 15 years, his firm has evolved into one of the Philippines’ top law firms. This year, he was included in the Asian Legal Business (ALB) Philippines Client Choice Lawyers’ first list of “10 highly recommended lawyers.” Since 2018, the Asia Business Law Journal has continually ranked him among the Top 100 Lawyers in the Philippines. In a virtual ceremony in November 2021, he was honoured ‘Managing Partner of the Year 2021’ during the Asian Legal Business (ALB) Philippine Law Awards. His leadership, professional triumphs, community development initiatives, and contribution to the firm, the Bench and Bar, and the public were recognized in the award.
Nilo asserts, “We are not the traditional law firm, we are dynamic. Our mindset is to always find ways and means, to explore uncharted territory and do everything necessary to deliver superior results to our clients and give them peace of mind, of course, all within the bounds of the law, ethics, and reason.”
DivinaLaw is a full-service legal practice known for proactive and results-oriented services tailored to customer satisfaction. Its expertise is a testament to its resources and accumulated experience backed by professional and collaborative work ethic. Founded by a multifaceted lawyer, DivinaLaw’s expertise encompasses the practice areas of Litigation, Corporate & Special Projects, Labor, Arbitration & Alternative Dispute Resolution, Tax and Estate Planning, Intellectual Property, Immigration and Naturalization, E-Commerce & Technology, Risk & Crisis Management, Legal Education, and Legislative Advocacy & Policy Reform.
DivinaLaw has two offices – one in Metro Manila and one in Metro Cebu. It is the sole Philippine member of Lawyers Associated Worldwide (LAW), a consortium of 100 independent law firms from over 50 countries. The firm is also the sole Philippine member of Legalink, a global network of independent legal firms. It has strong partnerships with 11 local law firms in key locations of the Philippines to further enhance its corporate, commercial and arbitration services.
Starting merely as a small venture, DivinaLaw today is more than just a law firm. In the founder’s words, it’s a battle-ready army for protecting clients’ interests, but also a family with genuine affection and concern for everyone aboard. As mentioned above, DivinaLaw has an extremely robust culture and motivated employees. And while everyone is adaptive to circumstantial adjustments, its leaders prioritize employees’ welfare. “This fosters unity and solidarity between management and staff, which enables us to weather challenges no matter how daunting they may be,” explains Nilo. In honour of their collaborative ethos and efforts, Asian Legal Business magazine has honoured them as ‘Employer of Choice’ for 2018, 2019 and 2021.
DivinaLaw has set benchmarks in legal practice in the fields of Banking and Finance, Corporate and Commercial, Litigation, Private Equity & Venture Capital, Restructuring and Insolvency which is recognized by Asian Business Law Journal. It has won the ‘Labor and Employment Law Firm of the Year in 2016’ and ‘Immigration Law Firm of the Year in 2018’ in the Asian Legal Business Philippine Law Awards. DivinaLaw was the finalist of the ‘SE Asia Law Firm of the Year,’ category of Southeast Asia Law Awards, in 2018 and 2019. It was also a finalist for ‘Regional Litigation Law Firm of the Year’ in 2018 and 2019 and ‘Tax and Trusts Law Firm of the Year’ in 2019.
DivinaLaw has also won Data Privacy Law Firm — Silver Award in the 2019 Datos Privados Awards of the National Association of Data Protection Officers of the Philippines. Last but not least, it has housed the Silver Anvil from the 54th Anvil Awards of the Public Relations Society of the Philippines.
Sitting upon the results of combined hard work, DivinaLaw is striving to innovate and continue glowing and growing as a business. The firm has a lot in the pipeline that will be uncovered over time. Recently, it has established a financial advisory firm. It’s willing to set up a special purpose vehicle (SPV) to take advantage of the prospects that the Financial Institution Strategic Transfer (FIST) law will almost certainly offer. This law allows banks and financial institutions to dispose of their bad loans and assets to an SPV, usually for a large discount.
Besides these, the firm is investing in technology and constantly working on new and trailblazing ideas. “We hope we continue to dream and gather friends, clients, and hopefully, more accolades along the way. The moment you stop dreaming, you stop growing,” concludes Nilo enthusiastically.
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Business Talk is a digital business magazine that caters to CEOs, Entrepreneurs, VC, and Corporates. While working with entrepreneurs and business executives, we focus not only on their achievements. Our mission is to shed light on business entities, including their innovations, technological benchmarks, USPs, and milestones/accolades.
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