In-House Counsel

Blueprint Consulting Ltd; Dubai; Hybrid; AED 350,000 - 700,000; Full time

Job summary

Blueprint Consulting Ltd in Dubai seeks an experienced In-House Counsel for international crypto and fintech ventures. You'll work with product and engineering teams early, assess cross-jurisdictional exposure, and help design structures that enable rapid deployment.

The role demands 10+ years in international law, hands-on cross-border disputes, and startup autonomy. You’ll navigate evolving regulations, coordinate with offshore entities, and shape the legal posture of innovative client

Qualifications

• 10+ years in international law and cross-border regulatory work.
• Experience with crypto, software, and fintech products.
• Hands-on with cross-border disputes and coordinating local counsel.
• Autonomy to operate without a formal legal department.

Responsibilities

• Draft and maintain client-facing documents: terms of service, privacy policies, contributor and contractor agreements, intercompany arrangements, and partnership and platform agreements.
• Run feature-level risk assessments across the US, EU, UK, Australia, BVI, and Cayman.
• Build the compliance posture: KYC/AML positioning, sanctions and geo-restrictions, licensing analysis, and instructing local counsel.
• Manage outside counsel on disputes, coordinating across geographies and controlling spend.
• Advise on corporate structuring and entity-related decisions to mitigate group-wide risk.
• Handle corporate housekeeping, IP matters, and commercial negotiations as they arise.

Skills

International law

Cross-border regulatory

Crypto/fintech knowledge

In-house/startup experience

Dispute resolution

Regulatory analysis

Job description

In-House Counsel - International, Crypto & Fintech

Hybrid | Full-time | Reports to the General Manager

We're a consulting and administration firm. Our clients build and ship software fast, mostly in crypto, sometimes in adjacent industries. Their products are live, their users are global, and their corporate structures span several offshore and onshore jurisdictions. We're looking for one senior lawyer to own the legal side of what we deliver for them.

This isn't a role where you review contracts someone else negotiated and wait for instructions. You'll sit with client product and engineering teams while features are still on the whiteboard, tell them honestly what the exposure looks like across the jurisdictions that matter, and help them find a structure that lets them ship. Most of the questions you'll face don't have a clean textbook answer - the products are new and the regulators haven't caught up. Success here looks like being in the room early, giving a clear view fast, and being the reason a client can launch rather than stall.

What you'll actually be doing

• Draft and maintain the documents clients run on - terms of service, privacy policies, contributor and contractor agreements, intercompany arrangements, and partnership and platform agreements


• Run feature-level risk assessments across the US, EU, UK, Australia, BVI, and Cayman - separating real risk from theoretical risk, and shaping feature design to move clients into safer territory


• Build the compliance posture behind all of this: KYC/AML positioning, sanctions and geo-restrictions, licensing analysis, and instructing local counsel where a domestic opinion is needed


• Manage outside counsel on disputes - instructing and coordinating local litigation counsel across geographies, keeping strategy consistent, owning documents and evidence, controlling spend, and calling when to fight versus settle


• Advise on corporate structuring - which entity signs what, where liability lands, and how a group should be arranged so a problem in one place doesn't become a problem everywhere


• Handle corporate housekeeping across the entities we administer, plus IP matters and commercial negotiations as they arise

What we're looking for

• 10+ years in international law, with real depth in cross-border regulatory work - not a domestic practice with occasional foreign matters


• Genuine experience in software, crypto, and fintech - you understand how a blockchain product works without needing the basics explained. Token launches, exchanges, launchpads, or payments experience is a strong plus


• Hands-on experience running cross-border disputes through local counsel, and structuring judgment shaped by what's actually held up under pressure


• Startup experience, or a demonstrated ability to operate without a legal department around you - you'll have research tools, an outside counsel budget, and a lot of autonomy, not a team of associates


• Comfort with ambiguity and giving a clear recommendation on incomplete information - \"here's my view, here's my confidence level, here's what would change it\" over \"we should get an opinion on that\"


• Speed - client timelines are measured in days and weeks, not quarters

Nice to have

• Qualification in more than one jurisdiction


• Prior in-house experience at a crypto exchange, launchpad, or payments company


• Familiarity with BVI, Cayman, and UAE corporate and regulatory regimes


• Experience dealing with US regulators or plaintiff firms

What we offer

Direct access to decision-makers - here and on the client side - with no committee between you and the answer. Genuinely interesting problems most lawyers never get to work on. Real ownership of how the legal function is built, because right now, it's a blank page.