Juha Koivula was born on April 4, 1958, in Tampere, Finland. Tampere is an industrial city in southern Finland, and its manufacturing and engineering economy provided the setting for the corporate legal work that later formed a central part of his career.
Koivula studied law at the University of Turku, where he received a Master of Laws degree in 1985 and completed court training. He also reported command of Finnish, Swedish, German, English and Russian.
The University of Turku was established in 1920 and is one of Finland's major universities. Its law programme prepared graduates for the Finnish legal profession, which required a Master of Laws degree for admission to the bar.
After graduating, Koivula worked as a lawyer at Seppala & Company, a Finnish law firm. In 1986 he began practising at Procope & Hornborg in Helsinki, where he remained until 1996. The firm had been founded in 1919 when the senior lawyers Lars Hornborg and Hjalmar Procopé joined forces. Its founders took part in the early development of the Finnish Bar Association, and by the 1970s the firm had become legal counsel to a number of major Finnish and international companies.
Koivula was admitted to the bar in 1990. The Finnish Bar Association, whose present legal form rests on the Advocates Act of 1958, governs the profession of advocates in Finland. He later returned to Procope & Hornborg as a partner.
In 1996 he joined Tamrock as legal counsel. Tamrock, based in Tampere, manufactured rock drilling equipment for mining and construction, and Sandvik acquired the company in 1997. Koivula then became chief legal counsel for Sandvik's mining and construction business area, where he was responsible for global legal issues, including contract law, acquisitions, litigation, intellectual property rights, and product safety and liability. His work emphasized loss prevention, and he gave practical legal advice to the business while helping its managers understand the legal systems of a global market.
In 2013 he became risk manager for the Sandvik Group, responsible for liability matters and liability loss prevention. Sandvik is a Swedish industrial group whose operations included mining and construction equipment.
Koivula is a member of the Finnish Bar Association, the professional body for advocates in Finland. Membership requires a Master of Laws degree and a reputation for integrity, and the association's legal basis lies in the Advocates Act of 1958. The bar developed from a private association formed in 1919 into an official body after the Code of Judicial Procedure took effect in 1948.
He is also a member of The Union of Finnish Lawyers, known in Finnish as Suomen Lakimiesliitto, which represents Finnish lawyers and publishes the periodical Lakimies. He belongs to the Young Lawyers International Association, founded in 1962, which provides international networking, legal education and exchange opportunities for lawyers, primarily those under 45.
