Cuatrecasas Foundation calls for candidates for Manuel Olivencia Award: this third edition will recognize good governance in management of COVID-19

2020-10-21T00:00:00
Spain

Cuatrecasas Foundation calls for candidates for Manuel Olivencia Award: this third edition will recognize good governance in management of COVID-19

Cuatrecasas Foundation calls for candidates for Manuel Olivencia Award: this third edition will recognize good governance in management of COVID-19
October 21, 2020

The Cuatrecasas Foundation is now receiving applications from candidates for the third edition of the Manuel Olivencia Award for Good Corporate Governance, which will recognize the best management by listed companies in Spain during the COVID-19 crisis. The jury will consider factors such as the virtualization of governing bodies; transparency; the consistency of measures; and environmental, social and governance actions. The award ceremony will be held in February 2021. An independent and prestigious panel, presided over by Matías Rodríguez-Inciarte, chair of Santander Universities and a member of the award’s panel since its creation, will decide the winning company. From this edition on, Matías Rodríguez-Inciarte will preside over the panel substituting Manuel Pizarro. This year, the jury that will decide the winner of the award has two new members: Óscar Fanjul and Rosa García. Óscar Fanjul is deputy chair of LafargeHolcim and Ferrovial and was the founding chair of Repsol. Rosa García is an independent member of the board of directors of Mapfre and was executive chair of Microsoft and of Siemens in Spain. The award honors the memory of the late Manuel Olivencia, a professor of commercial law at the University of Seville, vice chair of Cuatrecasas and chair of the committee that drafted the first Spanish Code of Corporate Governance in 1998, known as the Olivencia Code. About the panel of judges The panel is made up of 15 members, all well-known and highly recognized individuals in Spain’s business and legal spheres, and is chaired by Matías Rodríguez-Inciarte, chair of Santander Universities. The members of the jury are as follows: Juan Arena, former chair of Bankinter and member of the board of Meliá Hotels International; Francisco Ballester, honorary partner at Cuatrecasas; Jaime Caruana, former governor of Banco de España and member of the board of BBVA; Eva Castillo, former chair of Telefónica Europa and of Merrill Lynch Spain and Portugal, and member of the boards of directors of Bankia and Zardoya Oitis; Óscar Fanjul, vice deputy of LafargeHolcim and Ferrovial; Rosa García, independent member of the board of drectors of Mapfre; Cristina Garmendia Mendizábal, chair of the Cotec Foundation; Ignacio Gil-Casares, external propietary director of Merlin Properties and member of the appointments and remuneration committees; Luis Isasi, chair of Santander España and senior advisor at Morgan Stanley; Consuelo Madrigal, former attorney general; Francisco Pérez-Crespo Payá, partner at Cuatrecasas; Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría, partner at Cuatrecasas and former deputy prime minister of Spain; Alfonso Sánchez-Tabernero, dean of the University of Navarra; and Antonio Zoido Martínez, chair of Bolsas y Mercados Españoles (the Spanish company dealing with the organizational aspects of the Spanish stock exchanges and financial markets) and chair of the Madrid stock exchange. Rafael Hidalgo, counsel at Cuatrecasas, is non-member secretary, and Juan Aguayo, partner at Cuatrecasas, is the award’s director. Previous editions In just a few years, the award has become a reference point for the recognition of corporate governance best practices by listed companies in Spain. In its previous editions (2018 and 2019), the Manuel Olivencia Award for Good Corporate Governance was awarded to the International Airlines Group (IAG) and Amadeus IT Group, S.A. The panel highlighted the composition of their board of directors, their investor relation policy, the duration of directors’ term of office, the selection and training policies for the directors, and the transparency in remuneration matters. About Manuel Olivencia Manuel Olivencia was an accomplished lawyer who combined the vocation of teaching from his chair of commercial law with the desire to share knowledge from his professional work in Cuatrecasas, as a partner of this firm. His impressive professional curriculum as a lawyer, university professor, undersecretary of education, commissioner of the Expo 92 in Seville and chair of the commission that drafted the Olivencia Code, is complemented by his personal trajectory and the indelible memories he left his family, friends, students, colleagues and everyone who knew and interacted with him. He accumulated numerous awards and acknowledgments throughout his life, both in Spain and abroad, as a very cosmopolitan man that studied and lived in different countries. Manuel Olivencia received many awards, including several Grand Spanish Crosses, such as the Civil Order of Alfonso X the Wise, Royal Order of Isabella the Catholic, the Cross of Military Merit, the Cross of Saint Raymond of Penyafort and the Cross of St. George of Catalonia. He was named Favorite Son of Ronda and Adopted Son of Seville, and received the Gold Medal of Ceuta, where he spent part of his childhood. About the Cuatrecasas Foundation The Cuatrecasas Foundation, created in 1991, focuses its activity on projects relating to rule of law and access to justice in line with the United Nations Global Compact and the Sustainable Development Goal 16: peace, justice and strong institutions. Peace, justice and strong institutions. The foundation’s flagship activities are the Manuel Olivencia Award for Good Corporate Governance and the creation of the Spanish Pro Bono Foundation, a platform including a wide representation from the legal world to develop pro bono projects in Spain. More information Premio Manuel Olivencia al Buen Gobierno Corporativo

October 21, 2020