Damon Barnard Email & Phone Number

Spain

Stone Silver is a boutique management consultancy, offering professional and business services solutions to start-ups, as well as more sophisticated and established businesses, predominantly within tech, crypto, gaming, software, cyber defence and other online industries.

Gibraltar

Abacus Court was established in late 2013 with a view to providing cost-effective outsourced professional services to any business seeking a more integrated, pragmatic and solutions-focussed approach from its professional advisors. We achieve this by deliberately limiting the number of clients worked for at any given time, so as to more fully immerse ourselves within our clients' businesses and to align our working practices and deliverables with the actual needs of the business in order to ensure that we truly add value, over and above that which could be expected from a more traditional approach to the provision of professional services. We encourage our clients to think of Abacus Court as an outsourced “in house” resource, we feel that this best reflects who we are, what we do and how we do it.Abacus Court's primary focus is the provision of uncompromising legal, financial/accounting, HR, business administration and management consultancy services to discerning businesses with an international focus, predominantly in the media, e-commerce and technology sectors - from start-ups to publicly listed companies. Our services, experience and expertise readily crosses borders with current clients hailing from the UK, mainland Europe and the Americas. We actively discourage the use of a "per hour" fee structure (but will adopt this, if requested) as we prefer to agree our fees on either a retained or all inclusive, per project, basis. It is of the utmost importance to us that our clients should always feel comfortable seeking our advice and support and never be concerned as to the cost of doing so.

Remote

As Chief Legal Officer to the Rhino Entertainment group of companies, I was tasked with establishing, growing, and assuming responsibility for, the entire legal, HR, and regulatory compliance functions of the group, and risk management generally, across multiple licensing jurisdictions, distinct operating entities, brands and markets.During the course of 2022 I was responsible for preparing and managing the application process for, and successfully procuring, 3 new gaming licences for the Rhino Entertainment group - including its first EU-based licence (Estonia), and its entry into the highly-regulated Ontario market.

Gibraltar

Ignite RATINGS was the world’s first, truly decentralised and self-regulating investment intelligence and ratings platform for digital and cryptographic assets powered entirely by crowd-sourced opinion.Having capitalised the business via a successful crowdfunding campaign (ICO/ITO) in late 2017/early 2018, I assumed the role of Chief Executive Officer with day-to-day, and often hands-on, oversight of all operational aspects of the business, most crucially the development of its disruptive investment intelligence platform. Ignite was able to deploy the first closed-beta version of its software in April 2018, with the first public release following just six months later in November 2018.

Gibraltar

AlpNames (part of the Famous Four Media group of companies) was a Gibraltar-based Internet/eCommerce startup, established to provide domain name registration, hosting and other ancillary services to B2C and B2B consumers the world over.I was invited to join the recently-established AlpNames as its Chief Operating Officer and Managing Director in early 2015, and assumed the role of Chief Executive Officer shortly thereafter. At a time when AlpNames was almost entirely unknown within the industry, I was tasked with accelerating the growth of the business, its user-base and awareness of its brands as rapidly and cost effectively as possible, while simultaneously manoeuvring the business into a state of consistent profitable running. During my tenure, AlpNames grew exponentially, from less than 200,000 to nearly 3,500,000 domains under management; making it one of the world's largest "new gTLD" registrars by volume, and the world's fastest growing domain name registrar by daily registration volume at the time. This growth was achieved by ensuring that AlpNames was best-positioned to grow organically and without the need for any external marketing spend, made largely possible by the renegotiation of key supplier contracts, a focus on cost efficiency generally and the leveraging of third party assets/resources; which, in turn, permitted AlpNames to legitimately disrupt the industry status quo, particularly with regards to the emerging markets of the APAC region.As Chief Executive Officer, I was responsible for the overall running of the business and all internal, and outward-facing, operations; including finance, legal and regulatory affairs, B2B, HR, marketing, PR, strategy, business intelligence, technology, new product development, CRM and customer support.

Gibraltar

Austin, Texas, United States

VICTIV (Ruckus Gaming LLC) was established with the ambitious plan to develop and bring to market the first truly UX-optimised daily fantasy sports (“DFS”) gaming experience, mixing elements of traditional DFS with those of other popular online gaming formats. I joined Ruckus Gaming as a founding shareholder and General Counsel with day-to-day responsibility for all legal and regulatory affairs, as well as enjoying a considerable degree of operational input and influence.Focusing primarily on the US market, it was my responsibility as General Counsel to navigate the often undefined, “grey” regulatory regime that impacted the offering of DFS on a state-by-state basis; identifying and managing relationships and costs with local counsel, as necessary. I was required to assess the execution risks of launching the VICTIV product in any given market with reference to regulatory risk, organisational risk appetite and various other commercial considerations.Ruckus Gaming was sold to Amaya Inc. in August 2015.

Gibraltar

The etruvian Group/PokerStrategy.com had a typical annual turnover in excess of $60m with a regular EBITDA margin of circa 50% and more than 250 group-wide employees at its peak in 2011.Having served as Head of Legal Affairs and part of the Senior Management team for the etruvian Group/PokerStrategy.com for 18 months, I was invited to join a newly established group board of directors as Chief Legal Officer/General Counsel, continuing to manage the group’s overall legal risk and have oversight and day to day management of the group’s legal requirements, including a focus on start-up development and incubation, as well as the group’s company secretarial, HR, Workplace Services and property and estate management functions.As a member of the Senior Management team and, latterly, the group board of directors, I regularly reported to my peers on all group regulatory and legal affairs (including budgeting and legal cost control initiatives) and was jointly responsible for all of the group’s strategic and operational decisions, from such high level topics as investment in new product verticals and the disposal of PokerStrategy.com to more “hands-on” matters such as day to day people and workplace management.I was instrumental in the $50m sale of PokerStrategy.com and related companies from etruvian to Playtech plc in July 2013; a process taking 6 months and requiring the preparation and presentation of an initial Information Memorandum and more detailed Management Presentation to numerous potential acquirers, advising etruvian’s shareholders on proposed deal structures, project managing and undertaking vendor due diligence, reviewing and finalising transactional documents and ensuring a legally-compliant execution and completion of the transaction.

Gibraltar

Within this role I was tasked with assuming managerial responsibility for the Group’s existing legal function, while establishing a centralised service offering in Gibraltar.Drawing on previous experience, I was charged with heading up a 4 man legal team providing multi-discipline first line legal support to the Group’s core product offering, PokerStrategy.com, including the provision of intellectual property, litigation, contractual, general commercial and regulatory advice.I was personally responsible for identifying and clearing the various legal hurdles of bringing the Group’s second product offering, tradimo.com, to market – including navigating the financial services legislation of Gibraltar and key launch markets. This included protracted submissions to various European regulators to ensure that tradimo successfully obtained sufficient regulatory clearance prior to launch.I formed part of the Group’s Senior Management team, composed of both C-level and other senior management figures from within the Group. This team was responsible for devising and implementing the strategic goals of the business.

Gibraltar

Intellectual Property – I was responsible for all matters of intellectual property protection and enforcement as well as day to day management of the group’s considerable IP portfolio, including: trade mark and patent prosecution and enforcement; domain name registration, renewal and recovery; new brand creation and clearance; third party IP clearance; and brand licensing and monetisation. Litigation – I had oversight of all contentious matters for the entire group, including: IP enforcement, third party IP infringement claims, breach of contract claims (claimant and defendant), aggrieved player claims, data protection breaches, employment claims, domain recoveries (UDRP), defamation and fraud. Commercial – I was responsible for negotiating and drafting a wide range of commercial agreements, including: SEO and PPC services agreements; general goods/services agreements; consultancy and employment agreements; online and offline media buying agreements; public relations agreements; IP assignments and licensing; sponsorship agreements; image rights releases; affiliate agreements; partner/white label agreements; compromise agreements; settlement agreements; letters of comfort; non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements. As a senior lawyer, I was also accustomed to dealing with high value M&A activity including legal due diligence (purchaser and vendor), risk analysis, reporting to senior management and drafting of ancillary documentation, having worked on PartyGaming’s acquisition of both the CashCade group and the assets of WPT Enterprises, as well as its merger with bwin.Regulatory and Compliance – From a regulatory perspective, I was tasked with ensuring that the senior management and board of directors were kept aware of any material changes to the regulatory landscape within which the group operated. From a compliance perspective, I provided key legal support to PartyGaming’s licensing strategies and was also the group’s Data Protection Officer.

Manchester And Liverpool, United Kingdom

Commercial Litigation (IP/Media/Sports) – Within this role I represented leading software publishers in the protection of valuable IP rights; English premiership (and minor league) football clubs in relation to various commercial disputes (or avoidance), typically IP, defamation, sponsorship disputes, player disputes, intra-club disputes and general contractual disputes; top-flight PLCs and large private companies in relation to protection of IP rights, franchise agreement disputes, licensing disputes, warranty claims. Acting on my own initiative, I also developed a motorsport practice (a new income stream for the firm) which saw me acting for motorsport teams, sponsorship companies and racing drivers in relation to sponsorship disputes, driver disputes and general commercial matters.Experience of more general commercial work gained includes contractual disputes, shareholder disputes, commercial agency disputes, warranty claims, injunctive action and VAT and duties disputes. As well as being a litigator, I was often called upon by my clients to provide advice as to avoiding litigation and as such was experienced in identifying potential areas of risk and the required course of action for avoiding such risks. I was charged with developing Halliwells’ ground-breaking Non-Executive Protect product which provided a legal audit of a business and a thorough report highlighting areas of potential risk and/or concern for incoming non-executive directors, as well as for existing board members.

Psc, Law

Lpc, Law

Pgdip, Law

Ba Hons, Media Studies With Business Management And Information Technology

Education record