Kenneth Zhou is Head of Legal & Compliance, Asia Pacific North Region, at SIG Group, focusing on legal and compliance matters such as legal management, compliance control, antitrust, personal information protection, and intellectual property protection. Kenneth has over 26 years of experience in the legal and compliance field. Prior to joining SIG as Regional General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer, he served as Chief Regional Counsel or Group Senior Legal Counsel for renowned multinational companies, including Inter IKEA, Tetra Pak, Alcatel, and Lucent.

Kenneth is frequently invited by governments, institutions, media, and universities to deliver speeches and provide training on topics ranging from antitrust, competition compliance, corporate governance, data protection, overseas expansion, mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and post-merger integration, anti-fraud and investigations, contract management, trade secret protection, to dawn raids. He currently serves as a commercial mediator at the CCPIT Shanghai International Commercial Mediation Center and as a committee member of the Shanghai Lawyers Association’s Antitrust and Anti-Unfair Competition Committee. Kenneth also publishes a series of professional articles in LexisNexis under the column ‘Ying Thinking, Law Talking.’

Kenneth was recognised by Chambers & Partners as a Chambers GC Influencer 2025 in Greater China and was listed on the Legal 500 GC Powerlist in 2024. He was awarded ALB China Top 15 GCs and ALB China Top 15 CCOs by Asian Legal Business in 2024 and 2025, and also received the Outstanding Contribution Award and Corporate Legal Affairs Award from China Business Law Journal.

What are the most significant cases, projects and/or transactions that you and/or your legal team have recently been involved in?

I spearheaded the divestiture of the Shanghai factory site. Over a period exceeding twelve months, I negotiated with a diverse set of counterparties – including the local land bureau, state-owned enterprises, and private developers – evaluating both equity and asset sale structures and drafting transaction documents. The outcome was a definitive agreement with the land acquisition centre, delivering a result recognised as satisfactory by both the local government and our foreign headquarters.

Throughout the post-merger integration, I oversaw all employment-related disputes in China and South Korea. In China, I successfully defended the company in three consecutive arbitration claims arising from the relocation of a manufacturing facility, with each award rendered entirely in the company’s favour. In South Korea, I secured a complete first-instance victory in a high-profile lawsuit brought by a former senior executive.

How do you approach managing legal aspects during periods of instability or crisis to ensure the organisation’s resilience?  

I believe it is essential to remain continuously informed on global and regional legal developments and emerging issues. At the same time, it is equally important not to allow the volatility of any single jurisdiction or entity to distort the broader perspective.

Leveraging the Group’s established multinational systems and working seamlessly with the European headquarters is critical to identifying, assessing, and mitigating a diverse range of external risks. This ensures comprehensive coverage and, wherever possible, consistency and alignment across all jurisdictions and entities.

As team leader, I remain committed to integrating strategic vision, commercial insight, and a holistic mindset to keep the Group focused, aligned, and on track.

Have you had any experiences during your career as a lawyer that stand out as particularly unique or interesting?  

In 1999, I was part of the first wave of Chinese companies expanding internationally, undertaking greenfield investments in the United States. This involved land acquisition, facility construction, and the hiring of local management, laying the groundwork for sustainable overseas operations.

In 2012, I personally experienced a dawn raid conducted by the State Administration for Industry and Commerce as part of an investigation into alleged abuse of market dominance, gaining first-hand insight into high-stakes regulatory enforcement.

In 2022, I led the cross-border acquisition of all Asian entities of a market leader in the Chilled segment. The transaction involved navigating complex legal challenges across multiple jurisdictions. Following the acquisition, I oversaw the legal aspects of post-merger integration, providing end-to-end experience in managing the full lifecycle of an M&A deal.

What is a cause, business or otherwise, that you are passionate about? Why is this?   

Since early 2025, in addition to delivering keynote speeches and conducting training sessions, I have been committed to sharing my legal and compliance expertise through regular columns and book writing. This endeavour reflects a long-standing passion for knowledge dissemination and engagement with the professional community.

My continued enthusiasm is driven by three key motivations.

First, knowledge transfer: with over 26 years of hands-on experience in legal and compliance matters, I am uniquely positioned to offer practical insights that help peers, in-house teams, and the wider legal community navigate complex legal and regulatory challenges.

Second, industry visibility: high-calibre thought leadership authored by active General Counsel remains scarce. My monthly column for LexisNexis has quickly become a widely read resource, generating significant attention across industries and jurisdictions.

Third, reciprocal value: sharing expertise through writing and public speaking is, at its core, an altruistic act. By distilling lessons learned from decades of practice, I not only assist others in avoiding pitfalls and replicating successes, but also derive a deep sense of personal fulfilment and renewed professional purpose.

What factors influence your team’s decision to use external legal services versus handling matters in-house, and what criteria are used to evaluate their performance?    

The higher the risk, the more intricate the issue, and the thinner the internal team’s relevant experience, the stronger the case for instructing external counsel, with demonstrated capability to untangle and resolve genuinely complex matters serving as a key evaluation criterion. When the cost and time required by an external lawyer are lower than handling the same matter in-house, outsourcing becomes the rational default, with demonstrable cost-efficiency, measured per deliverable and per hour, guiding the assessment. Furthermore, if the external lawyer’s output can be utilised as on-the-job training for internal counsel or produce durable assets such as template suites, playbooks, or regulatory guidance, then the engagement creates continuing value. In such cases, long-term utility for the company and measurable uplift in team capability form an essential part of the evaluation.