General corporate counsel South-Eastern Europe | Siemens Energy
Deputy head of unit for investment screening | Federal Ministry for Digital and Economic Affairs
Head of legal, compliance, insurance and claims for South East Europe | DB Schenker
General counsel and compliance officer, public affairs | Greiner Bio-One
Executive general counsel and chief compliance officer | INNIO Group
Global director legal and compliance | Greiner Packaging International
Senior legal counsel, compliance and internal investigations | Porr
General counsel, group compliance officer and corporate secretary | LENZING
Regional counsel Europe and regional compliance officer | GATX Rail Europe
General counsel McDonald´s Austria and regional counsel EU DL Markets | McDonald's
Associate group general counsel and head of legal operations | Atos
General counsel executive vice president legal, procurement and communications | RHI Magnesita
Despite its–literally and figuratively–central position in the European economy, The GC Powerlist series has lamentably foregone a specific Austria GC Powerlist until this year. Previously, Austria was only covered by our Central Eastern Europe Powerlist where its general counsel were fighting for limited positions against in-house counsel from many other nations, leading to much smaller coverage than one would expect for such a large economy.
With this year’s inaugural Austria GC Powerlist, we are finally shining the right amount of light on the general counsel of Austria. And what a list it is! We have got chief legal officers at the helm of vast functions with many direct reports, sole legal counsel who have to stay on top of all their company’s legal issues without backup and everything between, with the wide variety of industry sectors you would expect from a GC Powerlist title.
It has not been the easiest business environment for legal counsel to operate in for some time now and Covid, the Ukraine crisis and rampant inflation combine to mean that we are unfortunately a long way away from business as usual. It is in situations like this, however, where in-house counsel can really prove their value to organisations. Reading the interviews we have done for the Austria GC Powerlist will give some idea as to how top-level general counsel deal with crises.
I would like to extend my heartfelt congratulations to every single general counsel who participated in this first-ever edition of the GC Powerlist: Austria 2022. Included within these pages are the most impressive in-house lawyers within the country, those who have utilised their legal knowledge strategically to provide business insights and contribute to their company’s success. Given the wide breadth of business challenges that virtually every company faces during the uncertain prevailing business environment, this is an even larger benefit to the companies of Austria.
I am extremely pleased to present this list of the most agile, innovative, and exceptional in-house lawyers in Austria.
Joe Boswell
Head of Research
GC Powerlist Series
CERHA HEMPEL is very pleased to be the exclusive partner of the GC Powerlist in Austria for the first time. We support the GC Powerlist as it acknowledges the best and most innovative in-house counsels in Austria who are developing innovative solutions to complex issues.
CERHA HEMPEL is one of the leading corporate law firms in Central and Eastern Europe with its headquarters in Vienna. With offices in Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia and a team of over 200 lawyers, we offer our clients seamless services across our offices and jurisdictions.
Starting from a traditional, long-established law firm, we have managed to develop into a modern international law firm through constant development and monitoring of trends.
In recent years, we have been able to significantly strengthen and increase our market position and our overall presence in the market. Nevertheless, constant further development and swift reaction to social and market changes has always been part of our corporate philosophy.
We warmly congratulate the recognised counsels of so many well-known companies. We have been privileged to work with many of them for several years now.
Tuesday 28 June 2022 saw global business development manager Ben Lovell and GC Powerlist head of research Joe Boswell travel to Vienna, an already beautiful city resplendent in the sunshine of a summer heatwave, to oversee the launch of The Legal 500’s first-ever Austria GC Powerlist.Â
 Alongside key Legal 500 partners and highly ranked firm CERHA HEMPEL, we invited the very best in-house counsel in the country along to enjoy a champagne reception and much-needed chance to network with their peers.
All GC Powerlist launches are special, but this was a particularly high-energy affair, helped by the over 30-degree heat in Vienna on the day and the excellent speeches from the charismatic CERHA HEMPEL managing partner Clemens Hasenauer and the always engaging Stefan Wochinz of Vaillant (The Legal 500’s Joe also pitched in with a speech but we’ll leave it up to the audience to decide how well that went). Â
 As you can see from the photos, the event was an enormous success, and we look forward to next year!Â
