Assistant General Counsel, Procurement

About the company 

The mining industry has steadily become worse at finding new ore deposits, requiring >10X more capital to make discoveries compared to 30 years ago. The easy-to-find, near-surface deposits have largely been found, and the industry has chronically under-invested in new exploration technology, relying on the manual techniques of yesteryear – even as demand accelerates for copper, lithium, and other metals to build electric vehicles, renewable energy, and data centers.

KoBold builds AI models for mineral exploration and deploys those models—alongside our novel sensors—to guide decisions on KoBold-owned-and-operated exploration programs using a combination of AI and HI (human intelligence). In the six years since founding, KoBold has become by far both the largest independent mineral exploration company and the largest exploration technology developer. Our data scientists and software engineers, who come from leading technology companies, jointly lead exploration programs with our renowned exploration geologists.

KoBold has proven its first discovery with materially less capital than the industry average and found one of the best copper deposits ever discovered: the copper is far more concentrated than the global average of copper mines, and this asset alone is expected to generate meaningful revenue for decades. KoBold has a portfolio of more than 60 other projects, each of which has the potential for another high-quality discovery.

KoBold is privately held; investors include institutional asset managers T. Rowe Price and Canada Pension Plan Investments; technology venture capitalists Andreessen Horowitz, Breakthrough Energy Ventures, BOND Capital, and Standard Investments; and natural resources companies Equinor, BHP, and Mitsubishi.

We are hiring an Assistant General Counsel to accelerate our mission.

About the position

In this role, you will be a key member of KoBold’s legal team, responsible for understanding the Company’s business, building systems for rapid growth, and guiding the Company toward success.  You will be responsible for reviewing and negotiating all technology, field operations (aviation, drilling, shipping) and other general operations commercial contracts for the Company.  You will own the contracting intake and management/CLM systems for the Company and work with other members of the legal team to help drive and implement the Company’s legal operations strategies and tools.  You will also assist with other compliance and legal projects as they arise. This position will report to the Deputy General Counsel.

Responsibilities

The Assistant General Counsel will:

• Learn the rapidly-changing context for the Company’s business and engage constantly with people throughout the Company to be able to make good business judgments, make sound decisions for the Company, and guide the Company toward success
• Advise and support internal clients, including geoscientists, technologists, field operations, data scientists, finance, human resources, and software engineers
• Review and negotiate all procurement-type contracts for the Company’s global operations which span a growing list of jurisdictions, including Canada, Australia, Finland, Namibia, Botswana, South Africa, and the United States
• Own and improve the Company’s contract lifecycle management (CLM) tools 
• Help develop and improve templates, contracting/risk standards and related protocols for all Company commercial procurement contracts
• Partner with the Company’s IT, Info Security, and Software Engineering teams to help develop and improve technology vendor procurement and evaluation protocols and broader Company policies such as AI Use Guidelines
• Identify and implement legal operations opportunities for the Company
• Assist with reviewing and negotiating data licensing deals, technology collaborations with universities, NDAs, etc. 
• Assist with other legal and compliance projects as needed, such as import-export, carnets, and privacy

 Qualifications

 The candidate must have:

• 10-12 years of progressive procurement contracting experience
• Strong experience working with vendors, especially technology/software vendors, services-based vendors, field/on-site vendors and/or hardware/equipment vendors
• Experience working with international vendors and operations (and agreements in global jurisdictions)
• Very strong contract drafting skills
• Strong organizational skills and attention to detail for protocols
• Interest in being a generalist and learning new areas of the law and Company strategy
• The ability to quickly learn new areas and interest in working through bespoke, challenging issues
• Experience and interest in legal operations initiatives, including strategy, implementation, and system maintenance, and a general enthusiasm for making our legal operations enable the company to move faster and more efficiently
• Experience working with and maintaining a CLM system
• Strong interest in science and sustainability
• A high degree of independence and ability to succeed with little supervision
• Active bar admission

It is helpful but not required to have with:

• Experience with vendors in exploration/mining or other natural resources
• Significant experience with CLM system implementation and upkeep, particularly LinkSquares
• Experience with M&A, joint ventures and other transactions

This position is full-time, exempt.

Expected salary range for this role is between US$200,000-$240,000 plus equity

Location: Remote, anywhere in the US.

Travel: Interest in occasional travel to Africa, Australia and other jurisdictions where operations are held.

KoBold Metals is an equal opportunity workplace and an affirmative action employer. We are committed to equal employment opportunities for people of any race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, or veteran status.