Team size: 32

Zhao Peng graduated from the Law School of Fudan University and currently serves as General Manager of Legal Affairs at Rsun Group. He also concurrently holds positions as an arbitrator at the Shanghai Arbitration Commission and the Shenzhen International Arbitration Court, and as Vice President of the Legal & Compliance Branch of the China Anti-Fraud Alliance. With over 12 years of experience in legal management within real estate enterprises, he previously led legal services for investment, financing, and construction projects at Seazen Group. Since 2021, he has been fully responsible for Rsun Group’s domestic and overseas legal affairs, driving the transformation of the legal function from a traditional ‘cost centre’ to a ‘value centre’.

His core achievements focus on three areas. First, building a comprehensive compliance ecosystem: in 2023, he led the establishment of the Group’s In-House Counsel Department and developed a process-driven legal management system integrated with legal AI. He compiled over 100 industry-specific thematic studies and litigation strategies, and launched more than 40 sessions of the “Rsun Legal Talk” series, forming a full-chain risk control system encompassing knowledge, systems, and tools. Second, addressing industry downturn challenges: he innovated practical tools such as the “Five-Step Debt Collection Method” and the “Fourteen-Step Asset Unsealing Method”, releasing hundreds of millions of RMB in capital liquidity for the enterprise. He optimised rents for commercial light-asset projects, reducing operating costs by hundreds of millions of RMB, and recovered hundreds of millions of RMB in losses through refined store closure plans. Third, deepening litigation professionalism: over the past three years, his team has handled nearly 3,000 litigation and arbitration cases annually, maintaining a 93% in-house legal handling rate and over 97% achievement of litigation targets.

In team building, he promotes a culture of ‘professional dedication and healthy collaboration’, organising weekly ‘Vigorous Runs’ for the team, with many members completing half-marathons. He has led the team to win honours such as the 2024 China Business Law Journal Outstanding Contribution Award for Legal Affairs and the 2024 WELEGAL Most Contributing Legal Team Award, and has personally received Rsun Group’s Outstanding Contribution Award and Difficulty Overcoming Award on multiple occasions. At the industry level, he participates in commercial dispute resolution as an arbitrator and has been invited to speak at the ALB China Dispute Resolution Forum. His legal management model provides a replicable template for the transformation of legal functions within the real estate industry.

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

Facing the cyclical challenges of the real estate industry, the team has advanced three core tasks as a ‘strategic supporter and value creator’. They have optimised commercial light-asset operations, leading rent reduction negotiations for twelve projects from 2021 to 2025, cutting costs by over RMB 988 million in total, and completing the exit of nine loss-making projects to reduce compensation by more than RMB 250 million. They have strengthened cash flow, securing over RMB 3 billion through litigation and non-litigation methods, setting an industry record by recovering RMB 1.3 billion within 20 days, and lifting major asset seizures involving nearly RMB 1 billion. Finally, they have resolved complex disputes, handling over 2,200 cases annually with a total subject matter value exceeding RMB 6 billion and achieving a 97% target success rate, including a 98% success rate in group lawsuits related to delayed delivery or certification, thereby avoiding potential compensation of over RMB 550 million and reducing project payment disputes by nearly RMB 300 million through counterclaims.

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

Resilience is built through a threefold approach of ‘methodology accumulation, proactive engagement, and technological empowerment’. This involves developing standardised tools such as the ‘Five-Step Debt Collection Method’ and the ‘Fourteen-Step Asset Unsealing Method’ to respond rapidly to crisis scenarios, including fund recovery and asset unsealing – for example, achieving a 53.33% land unsealing rate in 2024 to activate land assets worth RMB 1.1 billion. It also requires breaking the traditional ‘back-office’ role of legal teams by deeply integrating into the entire business process of financing extension and general contractor settlement, leading the resolution of debts for more than 20 projects and reducing interest penalties by over RMB 250 million. Finally, it entails independently developing a ‘process-driven plus AI-assisted’ legal management system with risk early-warning and case collaboration modules to enable real-time control of major risks, while employing the ‘1+1+1’ team model – comprising a business expert, a headquarters specialist, and regional legal staff – to enhance the efficiency of handling complex issues and ensure uninterrupted legal support during crises.

AI has been taken seriously as a potentially revolutionary technological change in the legal world for a number of years now. Has it had a meaningful impact in how your legal team works in this time?

AI has profoundly reshaped the team’s workflow. We independently developed a legal management system from scratch and proactively integrated legal AI modules, encompassing case analysis, legal research, and case classification functions. On one hand, AI enables the standardised handling of routine cases, such as contract review, thereby freeing up approximately 30% of the team’s capacity to focus on high-value tasks, including complex litigation and strategic negotiations. On the other hand, AI supports major risk prediction; through data modelling, it identifies high-risk nodes in financing and engineering disputes, assisting the team in formulating early response plans. For instance, in 2024 financing extension cases, AI achieved a 92% accuracy rate in interest cost calculation, providing crucial data to support settlement agreements.

How does your team contribute to the overall business strategy of the company? Can you share an example of a recent legal-led initiative that had a significant impact?

The team positions itself as a ‘business collaborator,’ transforming legal capabilities into momentum for strategic implementation. Under Rsun’s ‘real estate + commerce’ dual-wheel strategy, and in response to the accumulated loss of RMB 758.92 million in the commercial sector, the legal team led the establishment of a full-chain system encompassing compliance review, profit calculation, risk breakdown, path deduction, and cost prediction to drive negotiations for 21 light-asset projects. A representative legal-led initiative in 2024 was the ‘loss-making store closure optimisation’: by balancing the interests of the government, property owners, and merchants, the team minimised contract breach liabilities for nine store closure projects, recovering over RMB 210 million in total. All projects achieved a smooth transition, avoiding group disputes. This not only protected the company’s cash flow but also safeguarded its brand reputation, clearing the way for the light-asset transformation of the commercial sector.

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

My passion lies in realising the value upgrade of legal functions amid industry challenges, and this passion is particularly strong during the current in-depth adjustment cycle of the real estate industry. While the sector faces significant pressures, it is precisely these complex challenges – such as cash flow crises, project disputes, and transformation dilemmas – that allow us to discover solutions and breakthroughs through professional expertise and unremitting effort. From promoting the transformation of the legal function from a traditional back-office risk-control role to a front-end, value-creating role deeply embedded in business operations, to helping the company recover billions of RMB and activate idle assets through legal means, every breakthrough makes me appreciate the true value of legal work. At the same time, this career has provided opportunities for personal growth: I have pursued a doctoral degree to deepen my professional knowledge and serve as an arbitrator at leading domestic arbitration institutions, including the Shanghai Arbitration Commission and the Shenzhen International Arbitration Court. These experiences enable me to examine issues from a three-dimensional perspective – combining the roles of in-house legal counsel, academic researcher, and arbitrator – thereby providing more comprehensive legal support to the company and empowering it to navigate industry cycles steadily. This is the fundamental reason for my continued passion and dedication.