About

After 11 successful years at CNOOC, Leslie Zhang Weihua joined United Energy Group (UEG), the fourth largest oil and gas company listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, in September 2016. As vice president and general counsel Zhang is primarily responsible for business development, legal team management and listed company compliance management for UEG. With UEG actively seeking M&A opportunities on a global basis, Zhang’s enviable M&A experience from CNOOC – where he led its $15.1bn acquisition of Nexen, the largest overseas M&A deal ever made by a Chinese company – will play a pivotal role in the company’s planned expansion. To facilitate this growth he is already taking steps to establish a legal team that can help the group to operate globally. To continuously improve the breadth of experience held by team members, Zhang has incorporated a rotation program, knowledge management system and has included his in-house counsel in M&A deals from the very start of the transaction. The changes that Zhang has implemented in a short space of time have significantly increased the work efficiency of the legal team, allowed them to deliver better value to the management by improving their commercial sensitivity, and strengthened the working relationships among the in-house team in different jurisdictions. This operational efficiency has already brought a 15% reduction in legal expenses. He has also already established a close working relationship with UEG’s CEO. As Zhang says ‘to maintain a close relationship with chairman/CEO is very helpful to think from a management perspective, which enables the general counsel or the in-house team to deliver better legal opinions. Understanding the ideas and thoughts of the chairman/CEO and other senior management can assist in-house counsel to think “beyond legal”. Only in that way, should the in-house team provide value-added services to the client’.