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The Southeast Asia legal team serving multinational IT firm HP is recommended as one of the outstanding functions in the region. A nominating source speaks highly of the ‘very dedicated group of in-house counsel who have an extremely balanced understanding of the technical aspects of the tech industry as well as the commercial and business impact of their legal advice’ in countering the dangers posed by ever-changing needs of the business within the ‘highly demanding’ and ‘competitive market landscape’ of the IT industry in the region. The team has a presence in matters related to Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, Korea, Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar, and owing to this multi-jurisdictional remit must be flexible with regards to internal and external business changes. One recent example highlighted by a nominator is ‘the major and well-documented internal restructuring exercise in the separation of HP Co. into HPE and HPI entities in November 2016’ where the department was able to ‘remain a strong team to provide major value-add to their internal stakeholders and business units’. Recalling a positive experience of dealing with the department, one nominator notes, ‘we were assisting the team in a highly contentious dispute with regard to the alleged termination of a reseller, which would have a cascading impact on its supply chain. While the matter was being resolved, the in-house legal team took matters into their own hands and proactively instructed our firm to review and assess its entire customer) programme from a competition and contractual perspective, with the objective of ensuring that such disputes would never materialise again in the future and that all possible risks and exposure are well mitigated’. The team is full of individual talent including associate general counsel for Southeast Asia and Korea Carolyn Chua, who a nominator states ‘constantly pushes the team forward’ in a department that is ‘raising the bar for expectations within their industry sector’.