| JTI Brazil
JTI Brazil
The team works as a single cell, with no segregation of duties, enabling member to be involved in different matters. This has allowed the members that joined the team due to a specialization to develop into a more complete professional, able to support in matters they were not used to, such as Camila Parisi, who joined as a labour law specialist and is now a legal manager, with a much wider knowledge not only of different legal matters but of the business as well.
JTI is a company that is going through continuous growth in Brazil, which requires great involvement from legal in all the new initiatives and projects that are set up to enable such growth. The Legal team has been working closely in projects such as the importation of Kretek cigarettes from Indonesia with a company that is a competitor in such a country and in the setting up of a local cigarette factory, established in 2018.
The key to the success of the team has been the ability to communicate in order to ensure that the message is always consistent. All the members have a common understanding of the business, and agree on how to manage matters subject to the team’s assessment. This has been achieved with a transparent and open communication between the members, and is a key attribute of all of them.
Yes, D&I is in the agenda of JTI globally and is something also deemed as important for the legal team. Different people bring different ideas, and this is highly appreciated by Brazil’s legal team. As legal has an important and influential role in setting up internal policies, the team can reinforce the need to have D&I as a key driver of the company.
There are few industries that are more regulated than tobacco. And as such, the legal team has to work closely to corporate and regulatory affairs not only to ensure compliance, but at times even the understanding and proper implementation of adjustments due to regulation. The industry has been under discussions about the regulation of reduced risk products (the so-called e-cigarettes), to ensure that the current prohibition is removed, and the product can be properly regulated and then marketed in Brazil.
The legal team of JTI Brasil has tripled in size over the last 5 years. This means it went from one lawyer in 2014 to three in 2019 (the team is also supported by an intern and an apprentice). So even with this miracle of multiplication, the team is still a small unit supporting a company with over 1,000 employees, divided over 14 branches in 11 states. It all started when the company had just began operating its cigarette market business in Brazil. After a few months of operation that was receiving legal support from a lawyer based in Canada alongside with external counsel, JTI hired Claudir Ambra Lizot to take the role of legal manager and set up the legal department for the company in Brazil. At that time JTI’s operation was of few more than 20 people and sales of the products were done through a third-party distributor. The mandate for the newly set department was clear: acquire business knowledge and start to internalise all matters possible, reducing spend with external counsel, especially with consultations.
Business started to increase, and with this, more responsibilities were given to legal, especially with the acquisition of the third-party distributor, made to allow JTI to have full control of its business in Brazil. In November 2015 JTI Brasil went from 40 to 400 employees, and from a single office in Sao Paulo to eight branches spread around seven different states.
Throughout the years Lizot increased the team by hiring a labour law specialist, needed to help support with the 100+ labour claims the company had by the time of the recruitment, and continued to have also the support of a legal intern.
Business also increased, new branches were opened and even a cigarette factory was established in Brazil in 2018 to support JTI’s growth. By then the small team was very well known by the whole company, that knew that no matter how complex or urgent the matters were, there would always be someone available to support and take any challenge at hand as with the utmost care.
Lizot got promoted to director in 2018, and in 2019 the team further developed as Camila Parisi was promoted from a specialist to a manager and Mallu Mattos went from intern to an effective member of the team. These three, plus a new intern and an apprentice, are responsible for ensuring compliance with regulation in a highly regulated industry, as well as for supporting with all contracts coming from the national operation, overseeing and managing internal requirements for the legal claims handled by external counsel, replying to the constant internal consultations and also handling the internal procedures that a multinational company requires.
As the mandate for the department remains, the team continues to gather and share knowledge and experiences, so that whenever necessary someone is able to support quickly and preferably avoiding the need to seek for external support. A small team, with big responsibilities. But one that the JTI trusts to be up to the task.