Team size:  Over 20

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

Brand is the most valuable asset for consumer goods companies. I led the legal and IP team took a series of actions to hammer counterfeiters and copycats in China, from factory, wholesale market, to e-commerce platforms.  These actions (500+ enforcement actions, 100+ criminal prosecutions, raided 100+ factories)  effectively protected our beautiful brands in the market.

Our entire company is undergoing an AI and social transformation, and Legal department is an active part of the journey. We have identified key risk profile in AI generated marketing assets, especially on social media and digital commerce, with pragmatic guardrails put in place.  We have launched AI workshops for Legal team, to upskill the entire legal organisations in mastering emerging AI tools.

To implement company’s global strategic move, I have led the legal team to smoothly manage our portfolio transformation. This includes separation of a major business who generates 300+ MM Euros turnover in China annually.  

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

My approach focuses on proactive preparation, continuous monitoring, and strong stakeholder engagement to ensure that the organisation is equipped to navigate uncertainty with agility and confidence.

First, I have led the development of a comprehensive China risk framework that identifies key exposure areas and defines corresponding mitigation plans. This framework is reviewed and updated at least quarterly to ensure it remains aligned with evolving regulatory, geopolitical, and market conditions. It provides a clear roadmap for managing potential risks and supports the organisation’s broader resilience and business continuity strategy.

Second, I oversee the organisation’s crisis management protocol, ensuring it is regularly refreshed and operationally relevant. This includes updating critical contract clauses such as force majeure terms, establishing supply chain contingency measures, and preparing for regulatory scenarios such as dawn raids. To reinforce readiness, I organise leadership-level crisis drills involving key stakeholders across departments, ensuring that all teams can respond swiftly and effectively when a crisis arises.

Third, I place strong emphasis on proactive and constructive engagement with regulators and other key external stakeholders. Maintaining an open line of communication allows the organisation to stay informed about emerging enforcement trends and regulatory developments, enabling us to anticipate risks before they materialise. This approach not only enhances compliance but also strengthens the organisation’s reputation as a responsible and trustworthy business partner.

Through these combined efforts—structured risk management, disciplined crisis planning, and active stakeholder engagement—the legal function acts as both a guardian of stability and a driver of strategic resilience within the organisation.

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?

Absolutely.  AI brings significant impact on the way we legal team work. Our business partners have widely and proactively implemented AI, especially in generating marketing assets. If legal team continue to work with them through a manual approach, we will be soon left out. We have to be part of the journey, in particular, 1) to obtain a through understanding on how IA works in business operation, and then embed effective guardrails to ensure governance and compliance; 2) to actively and creatively adopt AI tools for ourselves to improve legal team productivity on tasks like contract review, marketing assets clearance and document creation.

Looking forward, what trends do you foresee in the legal landscape over the next 5–10 years that companies should prepare for? 

The geopolitical tension is unlikely to ease shortly in next a few years. Conflicting regulations (trade, sanctions, data privacy, cyber security) will continue to be the reality for the China general counsels of multinational companies to manage. Multinational companies, especially their China leadership members and general counsels, need to be able to articulate and justify company’s position about China, ideally with balanced narratives, and establish solid governance framework acceptable to all stakeholders. This is important to keep the relevance of the China business globally.