About

In an extremely fast moving market, Stefan Backman thrives on the challenges associated with providing legal services to one of Europe´s fastest growing Telecom operators, Tele2. He says ‘as an in-house lawyer in a small department within such an organisation, you really need to be able to move fast and make quick decisions, while at the same time mitigating legal risks’. Finding the right balance has meant Backman and his team are now natural business partners to the whole organisation, as he explains ‘you also need to be an enabler and a business partner’. Pioneering within the company, Backman has been involved in several M&A activities of great strategic importance to Tele2, including setting up major mobile network sharing joint ventures with competitors. Achieving cost efficiency without increasing external spend is one of Backman’s greatest achievements. ‘Tele2 Sweden now runs one of the most cost efficient in-house legal departments within the telecommunications sector in Europe’ he says. He achieved this ‘by implementing smooth internal processes and by working very close to the business’. As a result he has qualified for industry recognitions for cost streamlining, and despite constantly scaling down the manpower in the group, Backman’s excellent management qualities are recognised by his department in the company’s annual survey. On a personal level, Backman was awarded “Swedish In-house lawyer of the year” in 2014 by his peers and Affärsvärlden, a Swedish newspaper. He received the prize in part because he is very vocal in Swedish public debate regarding integrity related issues such as data retention regulations, having featured on national TV and newspapers. ‘This is perhaps not the classic role of a lawyer and I was therefore awarded the prize as a “role model” for other in-house lawyers’.