Serves as a leader of Akin’s international trade group in California and co-head of the firm’s technology sector group.
Deep experience advising technology companies on U.S.-China relations and the evolving landscape of U.S. export controls vis-à-vis China.
Named among West Trailblazers by The American Lawyer and Leaders of Influence and Women of Influence by the Los Angeles Business Journal.
Serves as a key advisor to companies navigating consent agreements with the State Department for violations of the International Traffic in Arms Regulations.
Highly skilled at developing enhanced compliance programs, with an emphasis of embedding compliance gates in business processes.

Based in California, Shiva has a global regulatory and international trade practice. Shiva serves as a leader of Akin’s international trade group in California and co-head of the firm’s technology sector group.

Shiva has won the highest honors. Most recently, she was named among the Leaders of Influence and Women of Influence by the Los Angeles Business Journal. The publication noted Shiva’s leadership in the firm’s “renowned international trade practice—one of only a few such practices in the Western U.S.”

The American Lawyer named Shiva as one of its West Trailblazers, singling out “agents of change in their respective practice areas.” The Diversity Journal listed Shiva as among the Asian Leaders Worth Watching.

Shiva is a trusted advisor to the world’s leading companies. She has significant experience advising on export controls, sanctions and evolving legal regimes to address new national security risks and foreign policy concerns.

For nearly 20 years, Shiva has counseled companies navigating ITAR consent agreements, subpoenas and other high-stakes matters. In addition, Shiva advises clients on export control requirements, helps to audit their current programs and enhance compliance processes to meet government expectations.

In the wake of shifting geopolitical alliances and evolving U.S-China relations, Shiva assists companies doing business with and in China. Shiva has counseled Akin’s major clients on compliance with new export controls impacting the semiconductor industry and advanced computing.

Shiva also assists clients in white collar defense & government investigations as related to export controls & sanctions. Alongside Akin colleagues who previously served as Assistant U.S. Attorneys in California, Shiva advises on enforcement, voluntary disclosures and investigations.

As co-head of Akin’s technology group, Shiva has a leading-edge practice at the intersection of emerging technology, regulation and capital. She helps companies facing new regulations and restrictions as related to privacy & data protection, artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing, cryptocurrency and other areas.

Beyond her client work, Shiva chairs Akin’s Women Firmwide Resource Group in Los Angeles. In this role, she helped facilitate a mentoring program and developed the California Women’s Initiative, a series of events that bring women lawyers together across the firm’s West Coast offices.

Representative Work

For a major technology company, helping the company navigate complex export control jurisdiction and classification issues, developing compliance programs that integrate export control gates in key business process, and assisting the company in fulfilling key requirements of its consent agreement with the Department of State.
Helped develop an award-winning technology-based solution to conduct due diligence on potential military end users (MEUs) in response to evolving regulatory requirements. Akin was recognized with a CIO 100 Award for this MEU tool, a state-of-the-art regulatory tool the firm developed to help clients comply with the U.S. Department of Commerce’s export control restrictions against conveying certain items where the provider has knowledge that the item is intended for a “military end use” or “military end user” in China, Russia or Venezuela. The application automates our clients’ diligence in determining the MEU status of their customers. According to CIO, the awards are an “acknowledged mark of enterprise excellence.”
For major technology companies, helped navigate and conduct internal investigations around the extraterritorial application of the EAR’s foreign produced direct product rule.
Leading investigations and subpoena response for major technology companies, as the Office of Export Control Enforcement ramps up its scrutiny of U.S. technology companies’ partnerships with Chinese entities.