Jennifer M. Smith
Independent Arbitrator.
Jennifer Smith has significant experience when it comes to international arbitration. A recognized leader in her field, she has advocated for companies involved in international complex commercial disputes for more than 30 years. Now a full-time arbitrator, she prides herself on being well-versed in the business and cultural realities of cross-border disputes, having appeared as an advocate and sat as an arbitrator in a large number of jurisdictions across the United States, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia.
Dual-qualified in England and Texas, Jennifer has extensive hands-on arbitration experience on a broad range of issues and in a variety of industries. Representative matters include disputes involving production sharing agreements, pipelines, gas processing plants, intellectual property disputes, petrochemical facilities, construction, drilling rigs, reservoir management, accounting issues, software licenses, distribution agreements, aviation, shipping, joint operating agreements, LNG, FPSOs, corporate governance, joint ventures, mining, telecommunications, charter parties, financial services, and insurance disputes.
Jennifer is recommended by Who’s Who Legal in association with Global Arbitration Review as a Global Leader in Arbitration and a Global Leader in Energy. She is also recognized as Best of the Best in Commercial Arbitration, Energy and Natural Resources, and Women in Business Law, and named as an independently rated Acritas Star as a stand-out lawyer in her field.
She is listed on the AAA Panel of Commercial Arbitrators, the ICDR Panel of Arbitrators, the LCIA database, the ICC and numerous other arbitral institutions, as well as on Global Arbitration Review’s Arbitrator Research Tool.
A co-arbitrator recently described Jennifer as “first class in every respect — extremely smart, thorough, collegial, responsive, and committed to getting the right result. She is tremendously talented, and I recommend her without qualification.”
The governing laws of the arbitrations that she has handled are equally broad and include those of England, Trinidad & Tobago, Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Germany, Ecuador, Poland, the Philippines, Texas, and principles of Sharia law.
Jennifer devotes time to professional and community service organizations and serves on the Executive Committee of the Institute of Transnational Arbitration, on the International Advisory Committee of the ICDR, on the Advisory Council of the Kay Bailey Hutchison Center for Energy, Law, and Business, on the Executive Committee of the World Affairs Council of Houston, and as a Trustee of Wellesley College.