About

CEPSA is an integrated energy company operating at each stage of the oil value chain, with more than 11,000 employees worldwide. The general counsel of CEPSA Group is Ignacio Pinilla Rodriguez and the legal department includes several teams specialising in different areas. The Downstream Business team is led by Ramon de Silva and its trading and bunker sub team is headed by Ruth Breitenfeld, acting as head of legal for Trading and Bunker. The Trading and Bunker team consists of four lawyers and one paralegal, who helps other legal teams at the same time. The team has an innovative 2+2+“n” structure, with two lawyers acting as legal counsel for the business and at least two contract analysts embedded in the business. Furthermore, the team counts on the expertise of its other internal colleagues from legal (the “n” factor) in order to ensure a holistic legal support to the business encompassing all its diverse and specific characteristics. Within the Trading and Bunker legal team, Maria del Canto Andres Carral serves as legal counsel and brings a fresh and innovative perspective to the team, always striving for excellency. Borja Zumalacarregui Espinosa de los Monteros and Borja Langelaan are highly motivated contract analysts, always keen to provide new solutions, adding value to the business and team. ‘It truly is a privilege to work with such diverse and dynamic people’, says Breitenfeld. The team recently implemented a “think globally, act locally” strategy: “think globally” to provide legal guidelines and tools to be used in the changing and demanding international environment and “acting locally” to enable the legal function to be an effective solution provider for particular business needs, both on a national and international basis. ‘It also allows us to build a common ground between two very different activities (trading on one hand, and bunker on the other)’, says Breitenfeld. Within this context, the role of legal counsel is to provide all the necessary legal support and to develop and keep the legal guidelines and tools updated. The contract analysts have the particular task to grant a timely and accurate response to the spot trading activities, based on the referred guidelines and tools. Being part of a larger legal team of the group, the team also counts on the expertise from other teams, who act as consultants in some specific matters. Summing up the team culture, Breitenfeld states: ‘One has to understand that we strive daily to continuously provide premium legal solutions to the business. Such a goal is only possible with each member’s sense of responsibility, to fight together for a common purpose. We encourage proactive and innovative attitude towards performance and change, so that we as a team are perceived by the business as a skilled business partner. The Trading and Bunker legal team has a tangible impact on the way the business projects are implemented – promoting imaginative and innovative solutions in order to enable the business to position itself ahead of its competitors’.