Loida Nicolas-Lewis

Loida Nicolas-Lewis
Born	Loida Nicolas 1942 (age 74–75) Sorsogon City, Sorsogon, Philippines
Nationality	Filipino American

Loida Nicolas Lewis (born 1942) is a Filipino-born American businesswoman who is the widow of TLC Beatrice founder and CEO Reginald Lewis.

From 1994-2000, Loida Nicolas Lewis served as Chair and CEO of TLC Beatrice International, a $2 billion multinational food company with operations all across Europe. TLC Beatrice was the successor to the international operations of Beatrice Foods. She assumed leadership of the company after the death of her husband, the African-American Wall Street financier Reginald F. Lewis, who had been the company's first chairman and CEO. Lewis served as an informal adviser and confidant to her late husband.

Currently, Lewis is Chair and CEO of TLC Beatrice, LLC, a family investment firm.

Lewis earned a law degree from the University of the Philippines College of Law in 1960 and was admitted to the Philippine Bar in 1968.

Lewis was the first Asian American to pass the American Bar (in 1974) without having been educated in the United States.

She worked for the Law Students Civil Right Research Council in New York in 1969, Manhattan Legal Services from 1970-3, and as an attorney for the Immigration and Naturalization Services from 1979-90.

Lewis was born and raised in Sorsogon City, Philippines. Her sister Imelda was former Chairwoman of Commission on Filipinos Overseas during Benigno Aquino III administration.

She attended St. Agnes' Academy (formerly Academia de Sta. Ines) in Legazpi City and went to St. Theresa's College of Manila, a private, Roman Catholic women's college in Manila, where she graduated cum laude.

Nicolas-Lewis met her husband-to-be Reginald F. Lewis on a blind date in New York City in 1968. They were married on 16 August 1969 in Manila. They had two daughters, Leslie and Christina.

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