Karl Pires

Karl Pires has served as an elected Governor and the Corporate Secretary of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce in Japan (CCCJ) since 2013.  The CCCJ is a private sector, not-for-profit business organization founded in 1975 to promote the development of commerce between Canada and Japan.  With over 400 member representatives, the CCCJ is a member-driven, member-focused organization and is the longest serving Canadian Chamber in Asia.  Karl is a founder and active member of the CCCJ’s Energy Committee.

Karl is a lawyer admitted in British Columbia and New York and is registered as a foreign lawyer in Japan, where he has practiced since 2008.  He is a Partner of A&O Shearman, an international law firm of nearly 4,000 lawyers across 29 countries in 51 offices including Tokyo and Toronto.  

Karl has been advising Japanese clients on cross-border transactions, including strategic acquisitions, minority investments, consortium bids and joint ventures, for more than 25 years.  He has extensive experience representing Japanese investors on major projects around the world in the energy (shale gas/LNG, offshore wind, solar and hydrogen/ammonia) and infrastructure (power generation, shipping and rail) sectors, having worked with numerous trading companies (Mitsubishi, Mitsui, Marubeni), utilities (Osaka Gas, Tokyo Gas, Chubu Electric, TEPCO), energy companies (JERA, JAPEX, INPEX) and financial investors (JBIC, Development Bank of Japan, JOGMEC, Japan Overseas Infrastructure Investment Corpoiration (JOIN)) on projects in Canada, the US, Mongolia, Taiwan, Vietnam, Indonesia, Papua Guinea, Australia, India, Oman, Qatar, Jordan, Spain, Italy and the UK.

Fluent in Japanese, Karl has been an adjunct professor at the Keio University Law School since 2014 teaching a course on comparative corporate finance.

Karl holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics and Asian studies from the University of Victoria and a Juris Doctor from the University of Toronto Faculty of Law.