About

Rocio La Torre spent almost eight years in private practice at recognised energy-sector heavyweight, Estudio Muñiz, Ramírez, Perez-Taiman & Olaya Abogados, before moving in-house at Peru LNG in 2005. Moving to Petrobras Energía Peru in 2010 as senior legal advisor, she overhauled both the legal team and the panel of external legal service providers with great success, also establishing training programs for all members of the legal department, updating goods and service contracts; and implementing the use of legal alerts and legal opinion registers. In early 2013 she moved to the company’s exploration division as senior project manager to oversee relations with the company’s partner in the development of the Lote 57 gas field, Repsol, managing contractual matters between the parties, including balancing and framework agreements, and negotiations with prospective clients. Her work in this role led her to be appointed to undertake due diligence for the possible sale of Petrobras Peru to China National Petroleum Company (CNPC), and subsequently, as the sole Peruvian in the team, to participate in the negotiation of the $2.6bn sale and the drafting of the sale agreements. Since the finalisation of the transaction in November 2013 she has occupied a non-legal role as commercial coordinator with responsibility for the transition process; indeed, she notes that if the sale of the company has been the biggest achievement in her career to date, taking on the role of commercial coordinator (given the position’s non-legal aspects), undoubtedly constitutes her biggest challenge.