John Bridges, Former AIEN Executive Director
John served recently as the Executive Director for AIEN, retiring June 2025, though prior to this he was the Manager of International Negotiations – North Africa and Europe in the UK for Anadarko Petroleum Corporation, with producing assets in Alaska, US onshore, Gulf of Mexico and North and West Africa. John’s career with Anadarko allowed him the opportunity to work and contribute directly on three of their major efforts including Alaska, Algeria and Mozambique in addition to conducting and supporting Business Development and exploration efforts in SE Asia and North Africa.
John began his career with Atlantic Richfield Company (ARCO) in its mining division Anaconda where he worked in Denver, Colorado and Reno, Nevada both exploration and supported operations in Butte Montana, Tonopah Nevada, and Tooele Utah. His successes led him to Bakersfield California to work the California Oil and Gas Units in Los Angeles and production and exploration in the San Joaquin Valley, Ventura and Santa Barbara areas. With this lower 48 experience, he progressed to Alaska with ARCO where he worked Prudhoe Bay, Alpine, and exploration in both the National Petroleum Reserve and North Slope Foothills area. He joined Anadarko in 2001 and was afforded the opportunity to work on the Negotiations team for Anadarko’s entry into Mozambique which has led to the discovery of over 75 TCF recoverable reserves. John’s focus then shifted to Business Development in SE Asia and participation in the company’s efforts in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Myanmar, and Vietnam.
John earned his MBA with a concentration in Finance from California State University - Bakersfield and his BBA in Petroleum Land Management from the University of Texas - Austin.
David Juarez-Navarro, Senior Manager & Senior Principal - Global Commercial Design, ExxonMobil
David Juarez-Navarro currently serves as Global Commercial Senior Principal and Senior Manager Global Business Development for ExxonMobil, providing global guidance across business lines such as Upstream and Low Carbon Solutions on complex deals structuring and negotiations.
During the 27 years working for ExxonMobil in various countries with regional and global reach, David has held numerous commercial positions of responsibility, including leading negotiations in different parts of the value chain related to complex multibillion investment projects. For instance, he was responsible between 2021 and 2024 for LNG Marketing and New Opportunities Development in Qatar. The previous 10 years he was in charge of identifying, evaluating and pursuing new exploration and production opportunities (e.g. bid rounds); leading the negotiation of agreements with prospective partners (AMI, JSBA, JOA, FOA, etc.); and discussing with Host Governments the commercial and legal framework necessary to attract private investors and develop long term win-win relationships.
Within that last context, he contributed for instance to the success of the opening of Mexico to private exploration and production investors as part of the industry working group that collaborated with the Mexican Government to develop the Exploration & Production PSC and License model contracts that later were executed by the bid rounds winners. He made contributions of the same nature in other countries in Latin-America, the Caribbean, Europe and Africa.
Over the years, David has contributed to the AIEN in several capacities such as co-chairing the AIEN Host Government Agreement model contract, co-developing the “Above Ground Risk” course, or speaking and moderating at several AIEN events in different countries. He has served as member of several Committees and holding some leadership positions including Director to the Board for several years, and VP Planning currently.
William W. Pugh, Of Counsel, Liskow & Lewis, APLC
Bill Pugh has been with Liskow & Lewis for more than 40 years. He has handled complex maritime and energy-related matters for oil and gas producers and other Texas, Louisiana and Gulf region businesses, including contract disputes, insurance disputes and energy transactions. He has earned a reputation for responsiveness, an ability to translate complicated concepts and for having extensive, pioneering experience analyzing, drafting and reviewing sophisticated energy-related contracts and insurance, indemnity and other contract issues.
His practice includes master service agreements, onshore and offshore drilling contracts, charters, flight service agreements, onshore and offshore construction contracts and other maritime and energy-related agreements. He has also helped international and domestic corporations, which often become Bill's long-term clients, integrate their contracts internally and following mergers or assignment of contracts (such as drilling contracts).
“Anti-indemnity statutes vary from state to state,” Bill notes, “often with nuanced pitfalls. One of my jobs is to offer our client ways to allocate risk through indemnity and insurance.”
Bill was managing partner of the firm’s Houston office and served several terms on Liskow's Board of Directors. He also served as the Team Leader of the Houston office’s Maritime, Oilfield and Insurance Section.