Some legal careers move in straight lines. Kevin Smith’s moves in concentric circles, always returning to the same core disciplines, with each turn bringing a wider field of responsibility.
Since March 2026, Kevin Smith has served as Chief Legal Officer of Solifi, working remotely from the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area, a role he has now held for roughly six months. It is the latest chapter in a career spanning more than 25 years of increasing responsibility in complex transactions and executive counsel, and by his own description, he approaches it as a “dynamic leader, corporate and commercial attorney, and strategic business counselor.”
His professional scope covers the issues that increasingly shape the work of a modern general counsel, from commercial agreements, corporate transactions, compliance, governance, compensation, intellectual property, and taxation to securities matters, investment activity, executive liability, cross-functional initiatives, and equity administration. At Solifi, that breadth comes together in a role focused on global legal strategy, corporate governance, regulatory compliance, and risk management.
Five Years at JAGGAER
Before Solifi, Kevin spent five years and five months, from October 2020 to February 2026, as General Counsel of JAGGAER, also based in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area. It was the longest single tenure of his career, and it followed directly from his time at Red Hat, where he had already spent years building the muscle for exactly this kind of role. At JAGGAER, he also led global legal operations and compliance, giving the role a direct connection to the governance and operational themes that define his work today.
Seven Years at Red Hat
Kevin’s time at Red Hat totaled seven years and one month, split across three titles. He joined as Senior Corporate Counsel in January 2011, a position he held for four years and eleven months until November 2015. He was then promoted to Director, Corporate Legal, serving two years and two months from December 2015 into 2018. His final Red Hat role was Senior Director, Corporate Legal, a position he held beginning in December 2018 and through January 2020, based in Raleigh. His tenure included the period surrounding Red Hat’s acquisition by IBM, one of the largest software acquisitions in history.
Nine Years at WilmerHale, and Before That, the Army
Kevin’s path into corporate law ran through nearly a decade of private practice. He spent nine years and four months as Counsel at WilmerHale, from October 2001 to January 2011, working out of the Washington, D.C., and Baltimore region, preceded by a year as an associate at Cooley Godward from 2000 to 2001. Before entering the legal profession, he served as a captain in the United States Army.
But the resume’s most distinctive line sits at the very bottom. From 1992 to 1997, he served as a Captain in the United States Army, an artillery officer qualified in Airborne, Air Assault, and Ranger training. He is, as his profile states plainly, a proud US Army veteran, and the discipline and mission orientation associated with that experience form an interesting counterpoint to the commercial judgment he later developed in corporate law.
A Counselor, Not Just a Counsel
What Kevin describes about himself, an “experienced negotiator and commercially minded counsel,” a “trusted advisor, earned through consistent discretion, hard work, and continuous learning,” reads less like a job description and more like a personal code. His stated expertise spans data privacy, trade compliance, intellectual property, artificial intelligence, security, tax, securities, and governance, a breadth that mirrors the pattern of his career: never specializing so narrowly that he could not be trusted with the next complicated thing.
At Solifi now, that trust is being tested again, in a new industry, under a new set of pressures. But the underlying disciplines remain familiar: transactions, governance, compliance, risk, and the legal infrastructure required to help a global technology company grow responsibly.
Read more : The Architects of Global Compliance, Legal Operations & Cross-Border Growth Transformation
