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

Over the past year, our legal team has been deeply engaged across a wide range of matters spanning compliance, transactions, contracting, governance, employment, ESG, investor relations, and technology-driven initiatives. A few of these include: leading legal strategy by overseeing negotiations, diligence, and regulatory compliance for multiple fundraising rounds; managing investor relations and Board governance by providing strategic support on high-stakes matters and maintaining robust documentation and governance standards that reinforce investor confidence and organisational readiness; promoting a culture of continuous innovation by supporting inventors and incentivising inventions, which has contributed to the expansion of our patent portfolio from four patents in 2020 to over forty in 2025; strengthening ESG foundations by advancing our sustainability goals through internal frameworks, formalised policies, reporting structures, and governance mechanisms; enhancing global compliance by strengthening oversight of our overseas subsidiaries and global operations to closely monitor cross-border obligations; and reinforcing the company’s disputes strategy by engaging with multiple global law firms and establishing a strong network of experts who can provide guidance and support in crisis management. In essence, these are some of the defining initiatives that have significantly contributed to the company’s overall growth.

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

Periods of instability or crisis always demand a legal approach that is calm, structured, and free from pre-determined biases. My first step is always fact-finding: validating information, separating assumptions from evidence, and building a clear picture of the issue. Once the facts are established, I focus on ensuring that we have the right partners in the room. This includes identifying external counsel who are not only technically strong but also trusted, commercially aligned, and capable of matching the urgency of the moment. Choosing external counsel who understand the organisation’s risk appetite and operating style makes a meaningful difference to how efficiently a crisis is managed.

Internally, I prioritise ring-fencing the issue by creating contained workflows so that the matter is handled by the right people, with the right expertise. Where needed, I bring in domain specialists – whether regulatory, employment, IP, or dispute resolution – so that each aspect of the crisis is evaluated through an expert lens.

Clear communication is essential. I spend significant time ensuring that the messaging is accurate, consistent, and aligned, both internally and externally. Miscommunication during uncertain times can escalate issues, so my focus is on transparency without causing alarm, and precision without losing empathy.

Crisis management is also fundamentally about stakeholder alignment. I ensure that decision-makers receive timely updates that are solution-oriented rather than problem-heavy. This includes outlining risks, presenting strategic options, and giving management the visibility it needs to make informed choices.

I also prefer proactive system-building over reactive firefighting. During or immediately after the crisis, we conduct a structured root-cause analysis to understand what failed, what worked, and what can be improved. This helps us convert each crisis into a learning and, ultimately, build stronger internal processes.

Finally, throughout the process, my role is to remain steady, independent, and anchored. Whether dealing with regulators, customers, internal teams, or investors, the legal function must be the calm in the chaos, even when the environment is unpredictable.

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

One of the most unique and defining experiences of my career has been joining Qure.ai as its first legal hire, at a time when the company was still in its early start-up phase. I walked into an environment with incredible purpose and high growth momentum, but no existing legal infrastructure. In many ways, I felt as though I had been handed a block of clay, with both the responsibility and the freedom to mould and shape the entire legal function from the ground up.
Building a legal team while the company was rapidly growing in the AI and health-tech space meant re-envisioning what legal should look like in a new-age start-up. It pushed me to stay flexible, think creatively, and approach everything with an innovative mindset. There were no legacy processes to inherit and no playbook to follow. Each day we created new frameworks, policies, templates, approval matrices, compliance structures, board processes, and risk guardrails, which eventually became the foundation of the organisation’s governance.

Over time, I built a specialised in-house team supporting operations across more than 105 countries, managing a broad spectrum of matters – from compliance and transactions to governance, ESG, and investor relations – which kept the legal function closely connected to every part of the business.
A standout aspect of this journey has been the opportunity to design a legal function in which technology and process work seamlessly together. By introducing self-serve tools, automated workflows, and modernised contracting systems, I aimed to create a legal ecosystem that is efficient, scalable, and deeply embedded in the organisation’s operations.

Personally, witnessing the evolution of the legal team has been remarkable. I have experienced the legal function as a one-person desk and now lead a team that supports the organisation across continents and time zones. Shaping that evolution through hiring, mentoring, and defining our culture has been extremely meaningful to me.

Ultimately, it is this unique blend of building, leading, and learning in a fast-paced environment that has defined my career. It has been intense, rewarding, and full of moments that continue to make the journey memorable.

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 meaningfully influenced how our legal team functions, but only as an assistive capability rather than a replacement for legal judgement. Our stance is pragmatic: use technology to handle the ‘mundane’ while keeping humans responsible for judgement, oversight, and final sign-offs. We implemented self-serve tools, templates, and automated workflows so that routine requests are handled more quickly and with consistent guardrails. This allows the team to focus on higher-value tasks. These knowledge-base initiatives and SOPs have made our responses swifter and more consistent. We frequently pilot and evaluate AI-enabled features where they demonstrably improve speed or reliability. Adoption is selective and measured, with every tool assessed for data handling, vendor due diligence, and other considerations before use, and human-in-the-loop review remains mandatory for any legal output.

We pair experimentation with formal guardrails. We have defined internal AI usage guidelines, require vendor due diligence, and insist on audit trails and human oversight for sensitive matters. This allows AI to integrate seamlessly into our systems without diluting accountability. The net effect is practical: faster turnaround on volume work, greater consistency through templates and automation, and more bandwidth for strategic, high-judgement activity. That shift has also encouraged a tech-forward mindset across the team, treating innovation and control as complementary priorities rather than competing ones.

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?

Our decision to handle a matter in-house versus engaging external counsel is usually influenced by a combination of considerations such as expertise, bandwidth of the internal team, and the strategic importance of the issue. As an in-house function, our instinct is always to solve matters internally where we have the context, speed, and communication needed to support our business. We seek external support when the matter requires deep specialisation, specific jurisdictional insight, or an independent perspective.

When choosing external counsel, trust is foundational. We prefer partners who demonstrate sound judgement, understand our risk appetite, and take the time to understand our business model and operational realities. We view this relationship with external counsel as a partnership, which only adds more value. Relevant experience and reputation are also key. We look at their track record with similar companies, past successes, and credible international rankings. External counsel must bring both technical depth and proven experience in the specific area where it is needed, whether it involves cross-border compliance, fundraising, IP, regulatory interpretation, or disputes.

Since Qure.ai’s presence spans globally, a full-service law firm is preferred. We scout for firms with strong geographic coverage, multi-jurisdictional expertise, and the ability to operate seamlessly across time zones when required. Access to local insights, especially for regulatory or commercial matters, is essential when entering or expanding within a market. We evaluate whether the firm is responsive, prepared for discussions, and able to engage in a two-way conversation where our internal expertise is respected. Partners who come into meetings having researched our products, industry, and regulatory environment signal seriousness and credibility. Their ability to offer thoughtful insights rather than generic advice matters greatly.

Cost efficiency and value are another practical consideration. We prefer firms that are transparent on pricing, flexible on fee structures, and willing to provide support based on the specific complexity of the matter. ‘Cost-effective’ does not mean inexpensive; it means receiving quality, speed, and clarity proportionate to the business need. At the end of the day, we judge performance by how helpful they are in practice – whether their advice is clear, timely, and usable for our teams. Equally important is how they show up: are they responsive, easy to work with, and genuinely invested in building a long-term working relationship?

Ultimately, we choose external counsel who operate with the same values we uphold internally: clarity, integrity, collaboration, and a solutions-oriented approach. When the collaboration works, it makes our legal foundations stronger and helps the business grow in a steady and responsible way.