Commercial Legal Advice
Commercial Legal Advice
The Inside Counsel is a select network of experienced senior international attorneys with direct 'in-house' industry experience. The Inside Counsel work as an 'in-house' legal consultancy, offering on demand, pragmatic and creative, cost-effective commercial legal advice and support to businesses of all scale and size.
Richard Blair, the Founder states "The Inside Counsel is a flexible attorney resource of experienced General Counsel to SME business and entrepreneurs, a virtual alternative to the expensive law firm model, that offers robust and creative legal solutions from experienced industry lawyers. The Inside Counsel grew from within industry and all attorneys in the network understand the importance of enduring business relationships and have worked in industry as General Counsel or senior specialist attorneys".
Richard has over 25 years experience in the global energy, heavy industry and real estate/port investment sectors. He has worked for Herbert Smith in London and Madrid, at BP plc in the UK, Spain, Venezuela, Egypt, Russia and Angola, at BG Group plc in Trinidad & Tobago, at Harsco Corporation (NYSE) in Steel, Rail, Construction and Turbine Manufacturing across Europe and the Middle East Asia Australasia and at Gulftainer in Port Terminal Management globally from the UAE. Richard is a qualified Solicitor in England and Wales, admitted as Abogado, a practising Attorney of The Madrid Bar in Spain and a Licensed Legal Consultant in the United Arab Emirates.
While Legal Manager for BP Venezuela Exploration & Production, I had the pleasure of working with Richard in Venezuela, he was Group Head of Acquisitions and Divestments, on several complex upstream asset divestments. He has a keen legal mind, is very client oriented and is a creative and effective problem solver who doesn't lose sight of the need for practical solutions to complex commercial problems. I highly recommend him.
Lee A. Matthews, BP plc, retired.
As former Group Director of Finance and Investments of Gulftainer I worked closely with Richard Blair, then Group General Counsel, on Port investment projects in Saudi Arabia, Iraq, USA, Russia, Scandinavia, South East Asia and East Africa. All projects had complex contract issues and required tactful stakeholder engagement and I have no hesitation in recommending Richard to deliver best in class legal support to any international private equity project where his commercial acumen and skill will help any investment leader recognise opportunity and solutions alike and mitigate the risk proportionately..
Richard Szuflak, Head of Business Development Asia-Pacific, DP World.
I work with Richard on legal projects in the Middle East and in Spain at present and as the former CTO of Harsco Metals I worked closely with him in Europe, The Middle East and Asia and his ability to engage in and understand the pragmatic sensitivities of legal risk in 'frontier' projects with different legal systems was impressive and I have no hesitation in recommending his legal services to any multinational company.
Clyde Kirkwood, Vice President International Operations at Edw.C. Levy & Co.
As the former CEO of Gulftainer I worked with Richard as the Group General Counsel for nearly 3 years. Some of the projects we worked on were in challenging international markets such as Brazil, Iraq, Lebanon and Mozambique to name a few. He is an experienced manager of legal and commercial risk and he also understands the sensitivities of international compliance and ABC. Richard has many years of global legal experience and I have no hesitation in recommending his legal services.
Flemming Dalgaard, Managing Partner of Fledal Advisory and Consulting and Senior Investment Adviser at A.P. Moeller Capital.