Gabriel Zubieta y Landa Ortiz

At the core of Gabriel's practice is the direct handling of the firm's most complex and highest-value labour disputes, together with all of the firm's collective labour relations work: the negotiation, review, and implementation of collective bargaining agreements, and the management of union relationships, collective disputes and strike scenarios.

His litigation practice is centred on high-stakes individual and collective disputes for major industrial, financial and consumer-facing clients, frequently involving executive and mass terminations, allegations of fraud or breach of trust, and disputes requiring the coordination of internal investigations, forensic accounting and evidentiary strategy alongside the underlying labour defence.

Beyond individual matters, Gabriel structures and oversees the firm's largest nationwide advisory and litigation mandates, including centralised, multi-jurisdiction programmes for financial services clients that require coordinating proceedings across more than a dozen Mexican states under a single, consistent legal strategy.

Underpinning his work is a consistently preventive philosophy: that most labour risk exposure is avoidable through careful documentation, early internal investigation and disciplined evidentiary practice, and that litigation, when necessary, should be approached with the same rigour as the compliance work that precedes it.

Gabriel is the founding and managing partner of Zubieta & Landa, Elizondo, the Monterrey-based labour and employment boutique he established in 1993. For almost four decades, he has practised exclusively in Mexican labour and employment law, building one of northern Mexico's most recognised labour litigation and advisory practices and shaping the firm into a leading boutique for employers across the country. As managing partner, he oversees the firm's two principal departments, Litigation and Consultancy, which together handle in excess of 3,000 active lawsuits at any given time. He works alongside long-standing partner Iván Elizondo Gámez, a partner since 2000 and co-head of the firm's litigation practice, with whom he has helped build and consolidate the firm's labour and employment offering over more than three decades.

In July 2025, he oversaw the promotion of a new generation of partners, Roberto C. Gonzalez Avila, Marco Marchand Aceves and Gabriel Zubieta y Landa Corona, reflecting a deliberate succession strategy to ensure continuity of service while expanding capacity for nationwide mandates.

Gabriel holds a law degree from Universidad Regiomontana and a Master's degree in Labour Law from the Instituto de Posgrado en Derecho. Earlier in his career, he served as a public official in the legal department of the municipality of San Pedro Garza Garcia and within the Government of the State of Nuevo Leon, giving him early and direct exposure to Mexico's labour authorities that continues to inform the firm's litigation and regulatory strategy. He has also taught labour law at several universities and is a frequent conference speaker.

Gabriel is President of the Nuevo Leon Chapter of the Academia Mexicana del Derecho Procesal del Trabajo, reflecting his standing among peers and his ongoing engagement with the development of labour procedural doctrine in Mexico. He is also a member of the Asociacion Nacional de Abogados de Empresa (ANADE).

Gabriel advises major industrial, financial services and consumer-facing clients. His client base includes companies with nationwide or multi-state operations and unionised workforces, served through the firm's nationwide network of correspondents.

He is regarded by clients and peers as a trusted strategic adviser at board and general counsel level, valued as much for his judgement in framing risk and structuring negotiated outcomes as for his record in contested litigation. For general counsel and heads of human resources managing multi-state workforces, unionised operations, or labour exposure tied to sensitive internal investigations, Gabriel is regarded as one of the most experienced and reliable points of contact.