The Association of Corporate Counsel’s Houston Chapter and The Texas Lawbook are pleased to announce the finalists for the 2021 Houston Corporate Counsel Awards who have done some amazing legal work and demonstrated extraordinary leadership during some definitely unordinary times.
The Houston Corporate Counsel Awards recognize in-house counsel who have played critical roles in major M&A transactions or highly complex commercial litigation matters. They are general counsel and senior counsel.
ACC Houston and The Lawbook are proud to showcase the accomplishments of these amazing lawyers.
The awards are usually announced and presented in late April or May, but this year’s awards event was rescheduled to Jan. 13 because of the Covid-19 pandemic. The awards event will take place at the Four Seasons Hotel in downtown Houston.
ACC Houston and The Lawbook received more than 80 nominations for the 14 categories. We employed a team of in-house counsel and outside lawyers to review the nominations and select those who are worthy of being honored.
“It has been the distinct pleasure of ACC Houston to partner with Texas Lawbook on this very important recognition of the Houston area’s finest in-house counsel,” said Exxon Mobil senior counsel Joseph Yao, who is president-elect of the ACC Houston Chapter. “I was surprised by the number of nominees, impressed by the quality of the finalists and amazed by their accomplishments in a year that was so challenging for all of us.”
Today, The Lawbook and ACC Houston announce the two finalists for the 2021 Houston Corporate Counsel’s Transaction of the Year. The finalists are:
- LyondellBasell Associate General Counsel Andy Gratz, who led the company’s $2 billion joint venture with Sasol (nominated by Kirkland & Ellis); and
- EP Energy General Counsel Jace Locke, who led the oil and gas exploration business through a multibillion-dollar corporate restructuring (nominated by Weil, Gotshal & Manges).
The Texas Lawbook will announce tomorrow the finalists for the Senior Counsel of the Year Awards for Small, Midsized and Large Legal Departments.
The Texas Lawbook’s partnership with the Houston Chapter of ACC, which is now in its fourth year, is an important part of The Lawbook’s mission to cover business lawyers and business legal trends in Texas, according to Lawbook publisher Brooks Igo.
“Our partnership with ACC Houston is a critical element in The Lawbook’s goal of providing insight into the practice of corporate law in Texas,” Igo said. “ACC Houston has more than 1,000 corporate in-house counsel as members, and it is the influential voice for business lawyers who work in-house in South Texas.
“The Lawbook team relies heavily on advice and support from the members and leaders of ACC Houston and its sister organization, the DFW Chapter of the Association of Corporate Counsel, for helping us to identify the lawyers and issues we should be covering,” Igo said.
Next week, The Lawbook and ACC Houston will announce the finalists for General Counsel of the Year, Achievement in Diversity and Inclusion, Achievement in Pro Bono and Public Service, Business Litigation of the Year, Creative Partnership and the Houston Lifetime Achievement Award.
The net income generated by the Houston Corporate Counsel Awards goes to two incredibly important causes: ACC Houston’s public school outreach program called Street Law and The Texas Lawbook’s funding of a full-time lawyer/journalist to write about pro bono, public service, diversity and inclusion in the legal profession in Texas.
Publisher’s Note: For more information about the Houston Corporate Counsel Awards, including sponsorship or ticket purchases, please Brooks Igo at brooks.igo@texaslawbook.net.