Summary
Overview
Work History
Education
Skills
Awards
Professional Highlights
Websites
Timeline
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ERIC BLACK

Henrietta

Summary

General Counsel with a proven track record of high productivity and efficient task completion. Expertise in corporate governance, risk management, and compliance, with strong skills in negotiation and drafting complex legal documents. Demonstrates exceptional analytical thinking and problem-solving abilities, providing clear legal advice and effective leadership.

Overview

29
29
years of professional experience

Work History

General Counsel

Vuzix Corporation
Rochester
01.2022 - Current
  • Chief legal adviser to the President & CEO and other members of executive management and Board of Directors.
  • Oversee all company legal matters across all departments regarding governance, contracts, corporate compliance, M&A, litigation, data privacy, intellectual property and employment law.
  • Responsible for assessment of known and anticipated risks to the company, including creating and implementing company legal strategy to respond to and/or mitigate such risks, responsible for setting, enforcing and evaluating legally compliant policies, and procedures.
  • Manage outside counsel, including maintaining relationship and budget.

Deputy General Counsel

EagleView
Rochester
01.2018 - 01.2022
  • Drives organizational transformation by assisting with the restructuring of the legal department while supervising a team of nine lawyers/non-lawyers within the legal department.
  • Functioned as the department lead for a re-engineering project of the Salesforce system by defining legal workflow and creating scalable and user-friendly contracts for the sales staff.
  • Oversees complex contract negotiations for numerous sales agreements, cloud business contracts, joint venture agreements, and vendor agreements while standardizing and managing processes to boost efficiencies.
  • Leverages creative and customized solutions in negotiating complex and high-value contracts for individual customers, including negotiating complex intellectual property agreements.
  • Partners with the procurement group to effectively administer vendor management processes and negotiate vendor agreements while reviewing all customer-related pre-litigation disputes and collaborating with external counsel on litigation-related matters.
  • Leads project management, oversight, strategic planning, and management of various compliance programs.
  • Delivers legal support for all Aviation Operations matters, including purchasing and leasing aircrafts, regulatory, and insurance-related concerns.
  • Implemented an automated process for sales and other departments to submit requests for legal support resulting in an increase in departmental efficiency.
  • Introduced the company's first request tracking process using Smartsheets to record and monitor workflow, thereby reducing the overall turnaround time.
  • Reduced redline requests by updating contract standard terms and conditions.

Vice President and Assistant General Counsel | HIPAA Privacy Officer

EarthLink
Rochester
01.2013 - 01.2017
  • Provided legal support for the sales organization and a support structure of network operations, procurement, real estate, risk management, customer disputes, litigation matters, agent program, commissions, HR, product development, and marketing.
  • Served as the HIPAA Privacy Officer of a public company and supported customer contractual compliance with HIPAA compliance responsibility while administering internal company compliance of privacy policies.
  • Delivered legal advice and counsel to senior management, product development, and marketing teams on all federal, state, and local regulatory compliance matters, in addition to providing general corporate and securities advice.

Senior Corporate Counsel

PAETEC Communications, Inc.
Rochester
01.2004 - 01.2012
  • Advised senior management, product development, and marketing teams on compensation plans, government contracting, M&A integrations, federal, state, and local legal compliance matters related to employee policies, HIPAA, and other privacy policies.
  • Offered legal support for Referral Partner Agreements, Agent Agreements, and NDA's while coordinating responses to Requests for Proposals and assisting in the operations of respective channels, including commissions, product development, and marketing.

Senior Counsel

Global Crossing North America, Inc.
Rochester
01.2000 - 01.2003
  • Headed the entire contract negotiation process, including developing complex contract provisions to support a sales force while negotiating high-value contracts with a focus on providing creative solutions personalized for specific customers.

Associate

Nixon Peabody LLP
Rochester
09.1996 - 05.2000
  • Delivered corporate counsel advice on contracts, multinational M&A, antitrust compliance, and financing transactions.
  • Facilitated client meetings by summarizing discussions and documenting essential points.
  • Provided guidance on responsibilities of officers and directors, ensuring regulatory adherence.
  • Advised start-up entities on legal frameworks to support business growth.

Education

Juris Doctor of Jurisprudence (JD) -

University of Virginia School of Law
Charlottesville, VA

Bachelor of Arts (BA) - Economics

University of Rochester
Rochester, NY

Certificate of Management Studies -

University of Rochester
Rochester, NY

Skills

  • Organizational leadership
  • Commercial litigation
  • Corporate governance and compliance
  • Corporate and securities law
  • Business process improvement
  • Executive counseling
  • Employment law
  • Contract negotiation
  • Intellectual property agreements
  • Team development
  • Mergers and acquisitions
  • Dispute resolution
  • Privacy compliance
  • Risk management
  • Managed services
  • Fiscal management

Awards

  • Rochester Business Journal Corporate Counsel Award, 2019
  • Rush Henrietta High School Alumni Hall of Fame, 2016
  • Willie W. Lightfoot Youth Advocate of the Year Award, 2008
  • Rochester Business Journal Forty Under Forty Award, 2006
  • Rochester's Emerging African American Leaders Award, 2006

Professional Highlights

  • Increased the consistency of legal responses and achieved balanced department workload distribution and shortened request response times at EagleView by developing and implementing uniform departmental processes and procedures.
  • Received a 'Significant Contributor Award' at the 2020 National Sales Meeting of EagleView in recognition of contributions made towards negotiating and overseeing processes for contracts.
  • Developed and implemented a compliance program and collaborated with leadership on risk management at EagleView while identifying potential legal issues and providing legal counsel to the senior leadership team on regulatory, insurance, and business operations.
  • Administered and maintained a budget of over $1M and negotiated large-scale contracts with numerous Fortune 500 companies, including Amazon, Google, Allstate, State Farm, and many others at EagleView.
  • Established and implemented new workflow processes, which resulted in improved group efficiencies, decreased external counsel legal fees, and shortened request response times to ~ 90% the same-day and 95% in less than 24 hours at EarthLink by restructuring the legal department and overseeing staff development.
  • Established a complex contract provisions database to support a $1B salesforce at EarthLink while leading contract negotiations for the company.
  • Directed a legal team of multiple contract coordinators at PAETEC in supporting the retail sales workforce of a Fortune 1000 company by leading the securing of multimillion-dollar commercial and government telecommunications agreements.

Websites

Timeline

General Counsel

Vuzix Corporation
01.2022 - Current

Deputy General Counsel

EagleView
01.2018 - 01.2022

Vice President and Assistant General Counsel | HIPAA Privacy Officer

EarthLink
01.2013 - 01.2017

Senior Corporate Counsel

PAETEC Communications, Inc.
01.2004 - 01.2012

Senior Counsel

Global Crossing North America, Inc.
01.2000 - 01.2003

Associate

Nixon Peabody LLP
09.1996 - 05.2000

Juris Doctor of Jurisprudence (JD) -

University of Virginia School of Law

Bachelor of Arts (BA) - Economics

University of Rochester

Certificate of Management Studies -

University of Rochester

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