About

A former legal director of the Venezuelan intellectual property agency, Ricardo Colmenter moved in house at Halliburton in 2005 where, as part of the Latin American group, he was responsible for Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Trinidad & Tobago and Suriname. In 2008 he joined oil and gas services company Weatherford International as regional general counsel for the western hemisphere. ‘It’s a huge portfolio of responsibilities given the array of jurisdictions which he oversees’, says one insider, ‘deals, litigation, compliance, training and legal recruitment, he covers the waterfront’. Indeed, Colmenter regards ‘the daily interaction with distinct cultures which undertake business in such divergent manners’ as both the biggest challenge of his position, and the aspect that gives him most satisfaction. He currently directs a team of 21 lawyers (plus ten administrative staff), and has developed a form of management/administration ‘focused upon three fundamental pillars: motivation; the identification of talent; and the accomplishment of defined objectives established in an annual executive plan’. Moreover, the implementation of an array of efficiency measures has seen external legal costs drop more than 60% during his tenure. Externally he has led on a number of integrated projects of global scale, notably Mexico’s Aceites Terciarios de Golfo, better known as “Chicontepec”. He has also, in an unprecedented innovation, originated and developed an advanced training program for the legal departments of state petroleum industries, including Petrobras (Brazil), Ecopetrol (Colombia), and Pemex (Mexico). The co-editor of “International oil and gas transactions in Latin America”, ‘he is without doubt, one of the most knowledgeable and dynamic of in-house counsels, a real generator of added value for his company’.