Speaker details

Biography

Dr. Felix R. Ehrat was the Group General Counsel and a member of the Executive Committee of Novartis from October 2011 to June 2018. From 1987 to 2011 he was lawyer in private practice. Felix has been a leading practitioner in Switzerland of corporate, banking, and mergers and acquisitions law, as well as an expert in corporate governance and arbitration. He started his career as an associate at Baer & Karrer AG in Zurich in 1987, became partner in 1992 and subsequently advanced to senior partner (2003 to 2011) and executive chairman of the board (2007 to 2011). Earlier in his career, he gained experience in US and Italian law firms as a foreign associate. Felix is chairman of Globalance Bank AG, a leader in ESG/impact wealth management, a board member and chair of the audit committee of Geberit AG, a SMI-company and the European leader in manufacturing and supplying sanitary parts, a board member of the single family-office of the Mueller-Moehl Group, member of the Advisory Committee of RepRisk AG, a global leader in data science specializing in ESG and business conduct risk, and a foundation board member of avenir suisse, the Swiss think tank for economic and social issues. He previously served as chairman and board member of several listed and non-listed Swiss and foreign companies. Felix was admitted to the Zurich bar in 1985 and received his doctorate in law from the University of Zurich/Switzerland in 1990 and his LL.M. in Business and Taxation from McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento/US in 1986. He completed several Executive Courses at Harvard Business School. Some of Felix’s current and past professional memberships include the Inter-national Bar Association (IBA) where he was co-chair of the Corporate and M&A Law Committee from 2007 to 2008 and currently chairs the Corporate Counsel Forum, and Association Internationale des Jeunes Avocats (AIJA) where he was president from 1998 to 1999. He is a past member of the board of economiesuisse, the federation of Swiss business (2013 to 2015) and a past president of Swiss-Holdings, the Federation of Swiss based multinational enterprises (2015 to 2017). Felix is a lecturer and a member of the Advisory Board of the Law School of the University of St. Gallen/Switzerland. He has published on legal, business and political topics. Honors and acknowledgments include the listing of the Novartis Legal Department as 2nd most innovative legal department in Europe (Financial Times, 2017), inclusion in the Financial Times Global General Counsel 30 list in 2016 and the Burton Award (“Legends in Law”) in 2013. He is also a member of the board of Locarno Film Festival, one of the largest international film festivals in the world. Felix is fluent in German (mother tongue), English, French and Italian.