The Foro de Gerencias Legales y Arbitraje Miami 2026 will be held on Friday, 27 March 2026, at the headquarters of McDermott Will & Emery in Miami. The event will bring together corporate legal directors, international arbitrators, dispute resolution specialists, and partners from leading law firms in Latin America and the United States.
The meeting will examine the growing role of arbitration as a key mechanism for managing business disputes in a context marked by major infrastructure projects, the energy transition, financial transformation, and disruptions in global supply chains. The event is sponsored by McDermott Will & Emery, Akerman, BBL Advogados, and Daniel Cuentas Arbitration – Mediation, and has the institutional support of the University of Miami.
The event will bring together leading arbitration specialists and legal representatives from companies operating in Latin America to analyse the evolution of dispute resolution mechanisms in key economic sectors.
Confirmed panellists include Camilo Vásquez, president of the Arbitration Committee of ICC Nuevo León (Mexico); Carlos Duarte, legal manager of OHLA (Colombia); Daniel Cuentas, arbitrator and independent consultant (Peru); Giorgio Schiappa-Pietra, legal manager of Binswanger (Peru); Loredana De Trizio, litigation manager at the legal vice presidency of Grupo Energía (Colombia); Luis A. Pérez, chair of the Latin America and Caribbean Practice and co-office managing partner of Akerman (United States); Pedro Freyre, chair of Akerman’s International Practice (United States); and Sandra Jiménez, legal manager of Sinohydro Corporation Limited Peru Branch.
The forum programme will explore how corporate legal departments manage complex disputes in industries that are strategic to the regional economy.
Throughout the day, discussions will examine how arbitration has become a key tool for managing conflicts in sectors undergoing profound transformation.
One of the central themes will be large infrastructure and construction projects, where legal departments play a crucial role in addressing disputes related to concessions, construction contracts and public-private partnerships. These increasingly complex and cross-border projects require effective dispute resolution mechanisms to ensure their viability.
The meeting will also analyse the role of arbitration in the energy transition, a process that is reshaping the regulatory and contractual landscape in Latin America. In this context, experts will discuss how to protect investments and manage regulatory risks in projects related to renewable energy, energy infrastructure and emerging technologies.
Another sector at the centre of the debate will be finance, where the growth of fintech, crypto-assets and cross-border operations is creating new challenges for dispute resolution in credit agreements, restructurings and complex financial transactions.
The forum will also address the impact of global disruptions on transport, logistics and supply chains, analysing disputes arising from port concession contracts, air and rail transport, as well as international logistics in a context of increasing commercial uncertainty.
Adopting a more specialised perspective, the programme will also explore sports arbitration, an expanding field that includes disputes related to player transfers, sponsorship agreements, image rights and doping cases within the sports and entertainment industry.
Finally, the meeting will examine the role of investment arbitration, a central mechanism for resolving disputes between companies and states under bilateral or multilateral investment treaties, whose relevance has increased amid growing investment flows and regulatory change across the region.
Marc Gericó, global managing partner of Gericó Associates, notes that the choice of Miami as the venue is no coincidence: “In recent years, the city has established itself as one of the leading international hubs for the resolution of disputes related to Latin America, bringing together global law firms, arbitration institutions and specialised legal teams involved in some of the region’s most significant cases.”
With this edition in Miami, the Foro de Gerencias Legales y Arbitraje Miami 2026 reinforces its role as a meeting point for companies, arbitrators and international law firms to discuss the legal challenges accompanying business expansion in Latin America. Increasing regulatory complexity, the growth of cross-border investment and the rising sophistication of infrastructure projects are placing arbitration at the centre of corporate risk management.
