Marjorie De La Cruz has made her mark throughout her 20+ year career by leveraging a balance of business and legal acumen while supporting core business initiatives across PepsiCo. With extensive transactional experience and the ability to manage through crisis, she utilizes a pragmatic approach to support transformation and the overall business strategy.
Marjorie has experience across multiple functional areas at PepsiCo, serving as a trusted and valued legal resource for C-Suite Executives, Boards of Directors, and various stakeholders. With a diverse background, stemming from a dual culture experience, she effectively adapts to the needs of a global organization, focusing on addressing complex challenges through innovative solutions. At the core of her success is her ability to manage complex negotiations, M&A transactions, and compliance.
Currently, Marjorie serves as the SVP, Global Chief Compliance and Ethics Officer, where she interfaces regularly with the Board of Directors and the Audit Committee. In this role, she leads a team of 60+ globally dispersed compliance and ethics professionals, supporting over 280K employees in 200+ countries. She developed and operationalized their annual online training to ensure alignment of global compliance with regulatory standards.
As the General Counsel for PepsiCo Latin America, Marjorie led 95 employees in the management of litigation, labor and employment, regulatory compliance, contract negotiations, and marketing law. She provided legal oversight of all M&A transactions, acted as an advisor to the LATAM CEO, and served on the LATAM Executive Committee. She successfully turned around Argentina’s business litigation exposure and handled complex negotiations representing millions of dollars.
While acting as SVP Chief Counsel, Global Groups and Functions, Marjorie provided strategic analysis, advice and counsel to enterprise areas. She provided expertise across global marketing campaigns, oversaw the entire global trademark portfolio, managed joint ventures, and supported significant sponsorships.
As Legal VP for Marketing for North America Beverages, Marjorie was instrumental in implementing processes and policies to ensure alignment with the company’s risk tolerance. She was instrumental in the negotiation of the sponsorship portfolio including the multibillion-dollar sponsorship agreement with Pepsi and the NFL.
Her earlier PepsiCo experience includes Legal VP of Latin America and Senior Legal Director of Latin America Beverages. Prior to PepsiCo, she was a Corporate Associate at Davis & Gilbert LLP and White & Case LLP focusing on a variety of U.S. and cross-border transactions.
She has actively served on multiple Boards of Directors at The United Way, The Tahirih Justice Center, Pepsi Bottling Ventures, and the PepsiCo Federal Employees Credit Union. Through these organizations, Marjorie gained significant corporate governance experience.
Marjorie holds a Juris Doctorate from Fordham University School of Law, Masters in Communications from New York University, and Bachelor of Arts in History & Spanish from the University of Pennsylvania. She has been honored with the Fordham School of Law 25th Annual Corporate Counsel and LatinoJustice Lucero Awards.
Marjorie is fluent in Spanish and resides in Bedford, NY with her husband and twin sons.