About

Since its establishment in 2009 the Ghella legal team has been involved in all critical business decisions taken by the top management of the construction company. The legal team has made a deep impact to the way the company conducts its business by reducing transaction time, leading to a reduction of the dependency of third party firms to manage increasing volumes of business, reducing back log and streamlining operations. Led by general counsel Lucia Pepe the legal team is composed of three lawyers at the company headquarters in Rome leading domestic legal affairs, and Valentina Grippa who leads international legal affairs. The legal team in Rome work in close cooperation with the four other lawyers at main local branches of Ghella currently located in Dubai, Sydney, Buenos Aires and Oslo and has negotiated, supported and implemented a number of large scale transactions. In June 2017, the joint venture composed by Ghella, John Holland and CPB Contractors was selected by the New South Wales Government to deliver the $2.81bn Sydney Metro City and Southwest Tunnel and Station Excavation (TSE) works contract. The joint venture will deliver twin new metro rail tunnels under the world-famous Sydney Harbour as part of the landmark Sydney Metro – Australia’s biggest ever public transport project. The legal team has been involved from the beginning of the project in the drafting, reviewing and negotiating process of all tender documents, request of clarifications issued by the client and signing of the TSE contract and joint venture agreement. In December 2016, the EPC consortium led by Spanish company Gransolar Group specialised in the construction of PV Plants, which includes the Spanish firm Acciona Industrial and the Italian company Ghella, will construct the world’s largest photovoltaic plant, the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park. Commenting on the team’s contribution to this project Pepe states: ‘The legal team, together with the commercial and financial team, attended all meetings, conference calls with the client or other joint venture partners, in order to achieve the closing of the transaction in due course’. The team is always central to meetings organised by ANCE, the Italian association for major construction companies, with the aim of improving the regulation concerning the infrastructure sector. On the team’s culture Pepe reveals: ‘The main characteristics of the legal team are its flexibility, resilience and proactive approach in all the company’s transactions. Such a culture has been developed mainly through selective hiring of people with strong diversity in background, with a genuine passion for energy and infrastructure business and with ethics and respect for the individual’.