Key facts
- Niscaya Governance will advise companies on engaging investors ahead of critical shareholder votes, the partners said.
- Partners are Juan Bonifacino, Kim Castellino, Effie Veres and Bradley Vitou, alongside Guerra.
- The team advised companies including Warner Bros and Lululemon while at Strategic Governance Advisors.
- The firm's partners will work mainly from New York, Washington and San Francisco.
- Niscaya joins advisory firms including PJT Camberview and Jasper Street, the partners said.
Cristiano Guerra, a former head of special situations research at proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services, is teaming up with four other industry veterans to run Niscaya Governance, the group said in an interview with Reuters published on November 10, 2026.
His partners are Juan Bonifacino, who worked as a banker defending companies targeted by activist investors and is an ISS alumnus; Kim Castellino, who led ISS' US research team; Effie Veres, a former senior equity analyst at hedge fund Citadel; and Bradley Vitou, who held activism defense roles at Ernst & Young and FTI Consulting. All five previously worked at Strategic Governance Advisors, a division of strategic communications firm FGS Global, and left in October.
The firm will guide companies on how to engage with investors on critical shareholder votes. Companies are increasingly turning to advisers like Niscaya to prepare management to communicate with shareholders and to anticipate how proxy advisors ISS and Glass Lewis may recommend they vote on proposed mergers, board composition and executive pay.
"We prepare companies to engage effectively with the proxy advisors and the investors who are casting these consequential votes," Bonifacino told Reuters. "We help our clients cut through the noise and focus on what will truly resonate."
The team, which advised companies including media giant Warner Bros and athletic apparel retailer Lululemon, is beginning work at the start of what some analysts are forecasting will be a contentious corporate annual meeting season. Since the partners began working together, they have advised dozens of prominent companies, retaining board seats for many challenged directors and helping get contested mergers approved, lawyers and bankers said.
Sebastian Alsheimer, head of shareholder engagement and activism defense at law firm Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, said: "The rules and dynamics of proxy solicitations are evolving rapidly and this team has a truly unique perspective that can be of great value to public companies facing or looking to avoid contested shareholder votes."
Bloomberg ranked SGA, where the partners previously worked, as the No. 1 strategic activism defense adviser to companies with more than $1 billion in market capitalization. Chris Cernich, who preceded Guerra as ISS' head of special situations research and co-founded SGA a decade ago, retired in August. The firm's partners will work mainly from New York, Washington and San Francisco, and Niscaya joins advisory firms including PJT Camberview and Jasper Street.