Biography: Aviation

Mr Carlos Sierra obtained a law degree from the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México upon his graduation in 1991, during which he wrote a thesis entitled 'International Law of the Finance Leasing of Aircraft'.

He completed graduate studies coursework in: commercial and civil law at the Escuela Libre de Derecho, Mexico; international law imparted by Duke University and the Université Libre de Bruxelles in Belgium; aviation law and contracts law at the International Air Transport Association (IATA) in Switzerland; and air and space Law at Leiden University in Leiden, the Netherlands, where he received his Master of Laws (LLM).

He has been in private practice for more than 16 years, and has practised law as a partner of the firm since it was founded in 1994.

During his professional life, he has been involved in the structuring and implementation of transactions involving the lease, sale and finance of commercial and business aircraft to various airlines, companies and individuals in Mexico. He currently represents major companies that lease and finance commercial aircraft. He has also advised lessors, financiers, commercial aircraft owners and business aircraft owners regarding their rights in various contexts, including issues where lessees have defaulted on their contractual obligations and insolvency and liquidation proceedings of various Mexican airlines.

He has been involved in repossession proceedings regarding more than 75 commercial and business aircraft under different legal and factual circumstances and has participated in the restructuring of obligations of various lessees under aircraft leases involving more than 150 aircraft, all in the context of the Civil Aviation Law, the Regulation of the Mexican Aeronautic Registry, the Law of Commercial Insolvency Proceedings, the Federal Labour Law and the general commercial and civil law in Mexico, among other statutes and regulations.

He has been a professor of commercial contracts at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. He has acted as a speaker and moderator of various panels on aircraft finance and leasing and aviation law topics at various international conferences organised by the Aviation Working Group, the US Trade and Development Agency, the International Air Transport Association (IATA), Latin American Air Transport Association, the International Bar Association, the Superior Tribunal of Justice of the Federal District and other local and international entities. He is an author of various articles regarding Mexican commercial law, aircraft leasing and finance, as well as on the convention on international interests in mobile equipment (Cape Town Convention) and the protocol to the convention on matters specific to aircraft equipment, both signed in Cape Town, South Africa on 16th November, 2001. He has also authored a chapter related to Mexico in the book Aircraft Repossession and Enforcement and has written various materials on contractual and commercial law. He also has the honour of being recognised by various publications as one of the leading experts on aviation law in Mexico.

Carlos Sierra is a member of the legal advisory panel of the Aviation Working Group, the International Registry Advisory Board, the board of the aviation law committee of the International Bar Association and acting president of the Latin American chapter of the ADVOC LAC association of independent law firms.