About

General counsel at Peruvian holding company Grupo Romero, Michel Biber directs a 21-strong team that advises on all the legal requirements of the group’s constituent companies, with the exception of those in the finance and insurance sectors. Given the aggressive regional expansion of a number of the group’s businesses, most notably Alicorp, which in recent years has acquired PROPERSA, in Colombia (2008), Argentine entities The Value Brand Company (2008) and Sanford (2010), as well as Chile’s Salmofood (2012), and most recently Industrias Teal, in Peru, and Pastifico Santa Amalia, in Brazil (both 2013). One proponent identifies him as ‘probably the most M&A-experienced in house in the Peruvian market’. Biber himself regards the struggle to develop and then maintain the quality of his team and the ‘commitment to excellence in the legal service we provide’ as the greatest challenges posed by his role. Certainly law firms recognise the full extent to which he has succeeded. ‘He’s one of the best corporate counsel I have ever dealt with worldwide’, comments Miranda & Amado’s Luis Miranda, and Posse Herrera & Ruíz’s José Alejandro Torres regards him as ‘an excellent lawyer and an outstanding in house counsel, one who trusts his lawyers, retains focus and clarity, and can negotiate strongly as the case requires. A truly admirable figure’.