Wan Hilwanie Ariff is a legal practitioner and the Senior Managing Partner of Messrs. Ariff & Co, an established legal firm based in Kuala Lumpur.
She is also currently the President of International Malaysian Society of Maritime Law (IMSML) which is a member of Comite Maritime International and have served on the Bar Council Committee for Shipping and Admiralty Law for several years.
She was a Petronas scholar and graduated from the London School of Economics and Political Science with Bachelor of Laws (LL.B) (Honours) in 1997. In 1998, she obtained her Certificate of Legal Practice and was called to the Malaysian Bar in 1999. She then obtained Master of Laws (LL.M) (Merit) in Maritime Law from the University College London in 2003.
Her area of legal expertise is in shipping and admiralty law, ship financing, corporate banking work including Islamic finance, conveyancing work including ship sale and purchase, charterparties, offshore construction, mergers and acquisitions and oil and gas. She also conducts public and private seminars, workshops and talks on shipping law in particular ship sale and purchase, ship financing and charter parties. She has extensive experience in noncontentious and legal advisory work on maritime legal issues and has acted as legal counsel for several banks, financial institutions, governmental agencies, public listed companies and both local and international corporations including in Indonesia, India, China, UAE and Singapore. She has served on the board of directors of several companies including a ship owning company and an Indonesian construction and oil and gas company
She has been named as one of World’s leading practitioners in Lexology: Who’s Who Legal for Transport 2024 and Southeast Asia 2024 for Shipping.
