About

The German multinational automotive company, Daimler, currently operates in Singapore through four companies: Daimler South East Asia, Daimler Commercial Vehicles South East Asia, Daimler Financial Services Africa and Asia Pacific and Daimler Fleet Management Singapore. Heading the six-person-strong legal team is regional general counsel for South East Asia and Pacific, Michael Mazart who oversees and is responsible for legal matters of all Daimler businesses in seven markets in the Asia Pacific region, with 12 local general counsels located in different markets reporting in to him. With the growth of Daimler’s operations, the increasing importance of the Asia Pacific region and the recognised strategic value of the in-house legal team in Singapore, the team expanded and was reorganised in 2016-2017. Describing the new structure of the local team, Mazart says, ‘our legal team in Singapore is structured as a regional legal department and comprises of the regional general counsel for Asia Pacific, two general counsels responsible for the local Singapore entities, two legal counsels, and one administrative staff’. Other key members of the team are general counsels Aldana Lopez and Joanne Chia who are responsible for providing expert and strategic legal advice to the management and all departments of the Daimler Financial Services Africa and Asia Pacific Regional Office in Singapore and Daimler’s automotive sales, aftersales and local financial services business in Singapore respectively. One of the most significant projects that the legal team in Singapore was involved in recently was the separation of the Daimler divisional units in Singapore into independent legal entities. Explaining the significance of this project and the efforts of the legal team, Mazart says that, ‘in order to understand the magnitude of the project, it is worth mentioning that until then, all business units of Daimler – save for Financial Services– had been operating mainly under one local legal entity in the different markets, on a worldwide level. Although a few other Daimler entities in the world had already successfully implemented the separation, the project remained particularly challenging for our local team because the set-up that existed in Singapore before the launch of the project did not fit squarely within any of the blue prints that was provided by Daimler headquarters. As a result, the local team (including legal) was obliged to come up with a bespoke format that, while aligned with the overall goal of the global project, would take into account the Singapore-specific set-up’. The legal team also gained significant internal recognition for playing a crucial role in building bridges between the different stakeholders and working with them in successfully developing strategic and legal solutions to push the project forward and meet critical milestones. On the team’s ethos, Mazart notes, ‘our team culture is based on communication and best-practice-sharing enriched by our cultural diversity and the different skills and experiences that each member brings to the team. We do this by having a culturally diverse team (currently with three different nationalities) and by promoting regular communication in different formats’.