Associate Director, Counsel APAC

Job Summary

This role will be a senior counsel advising the APAC commercial team on matters of commercial law across APAC, with a focus on China. The role will be a senior member of the team in China and will also be a senior member of the trade compliance team managed from the UK. The role will provide pragmatic legal advice on a broad range of transactions to support the continued growth and expansion of Oxford Nanopore in APAC. The role will work closely with the Leadership, Business Manager, China, Finance, and HR on broad range of needs from sales and marketing agreements in APAC, privacy and cybersecurity policies, risk mitigation to supporting IP acquisition and potential commercial or IP litigation in China.

Responsible for drafting, negotiation and execution of sales related commercial contracts and other customer-orientated agreements. Involves independent judgement and analysis of contracts, including identification of legal and business- related issues and their resolution.

Oxford Nanopore’s sequencing technology has evolved substantially over recent years and is now both competitive on traditional market metrics, as well as offering disruptive features (real-time, scalability, adaptive sampling, methylation, and direct RNA). These breakthrough features can lead to a true reshaping of the market of genomic analysis. To reflect the development of the technology, Oxford Nanopore is driving an expansion of the customer base beyond a research users, to applied industrial, clinical and biopharma users.

Key Duties & Responsibilities:

• Delivery of legal services in APAC
• Review moderate to complex solicitations and work closely with the sales organization to prepare specialized and/or non-routine responses to requests for proposals, bids, tenders and contracts
• Analyze and negotiate contract requirements, special provisions and terms and conditions to align with company standards and ensure compliance with corporate business strategy, policies and commercial procedures
• Review, draft and negotiate bespoke agreements for large opportunities and liaise with key stakeholders to create executive summary to be sent for approval to the executive team
• Review, draft and negotiate business development agreements.
• Help maintain APAC commercial legal templates.
• Prepare and send approval requests to SMEs in accordance with internal escalation processes.
• Prepare signature memo with all relevant approvals and routes for signature.
• File all fully executed agreements and negotiate any related amendment.
• Serve as a focal point for communication with finance and commercial teams on APAC customer contracts.
• Advise and support commercial and operations teams with respect to commercial contracting/sales in APAC including close working with Business Manager, China, contract managers and be part of negotiation escalation team
• Advise and support commercial and operations teams in APAC, including working alongside leadership with respect to establishment of contracting norms, and part of negotiation escalation team
• Support litigation in APAC in consultation with IP and Leadership
• Support export and trade compliance in China in coordination with local team in China and trade compliance team in the UK
• Help with corporate secretarial matters in APAC
• Advise and support leadership and operations teams alongside General Counsel with real property agreements in APAC
• Work with leadership and regulatory team in the UK in establishing and maintaining compliance with APAC regulations with respect to manufacture and marketing of diagnostic products
• Work with the General Counsel to maintain the currency and training on the internal governance and compliance policies for the APAC subsidiaries, implementing changes in accordance with corporate governance code including processes to demonstrated ONT’s board compliance regarding their duties to both internal and external stakeholders.
• Assuring promotional materials and activities comply with all relevant rules and laws in APAC
• Coordinate, in consultation with the General Counsel and leadership, inbound and outbound interactions with government regulators in APAC.
• Advise on compliance with all laws and areas of regulatory compliance and risk for all operating areas applicable to APAC operations, including any necessary policy modifications to ensure compliance, participating in the development, and drafting of policies.

PERSON SPECIFICATION

Essential

Qualifications/ Education

• Qualified corporate and/or commercial lawyer with at least 3 years PQE
• Ideally with China legal degree with a plus for a UK or US legal LLM

Experience

• Experience supporting commercial contracting in the life sciences or technology sectors
• Ideally, at least one year’s experience in a major law firm and one year’s experience in-house

Knowledge/Skills/

Abilities

• Strong written and oral communication skills -ideally in English and Mandarin
• Effective leadership and interpersonal skills

Attitude/Other

Requirements

• A self-starter with the ability to work independently and in a team and manage numerous matters and competing priorities effectively.
• Enthusiasm for taking on new responsibilities, even if outside areas of expertise
• Able to work in extremely fast-paced environment, collaboratively, and autonomously
• Expected to work autonomously and take ownership
• High level of accuracy and attention to detail.
• Able to thrive with the space and responsibility to solve problems and make the right decisions
• A team player who operates best without lots of bureaucracy and gets things done
• Logical approach towards work. Not afraid to make mistakes but will use data and logic to backup decisions and improve understanding
• You are our mission to improve people’s relationship with their money
• Open minded and willing to take on new challenges
• Willingness and ability to travel

