In-house interviews

Kelly Young, Marie Curie

Marie Curie’s GC on strategy, budgets and working with CMS

For Kelly Young, incumbent general counsel and company secretary at Marie Curie, the charity feels more like a corporation than any other entity. Marie Curie is the largest funder of palliative care in the country, and its business lines include 160 shops, 450 doctors, clinical services and licensing intellectual property from garden supplies to stationery. […]

Smiths to Sonnedix: GC Mel Rowlands’ new role in renewables

Longtime in-houser Mel Rowlands had a knock-out year in 2023, making a juxtaposing career change last July. The former group general counsel of Smiths Group, a 170-year-old diversified industrial conglomerate with 20,000 employees, made the move to 15-years young Sonnedix, a renewable energy producer. Rowlands couldn’t have joined the sustainable power sector at a better […]

Lime’s Sarah Binder: “No GC needs the budget they want”

Fighting referendums and interfacing with nearly 300 cities is all in a day’s work for Sarah Binder. Relocating from London to San Francisco, she joined the legal team at micromobility company Lime in May 2021, which now comprises 20 lawyers and eight paralegals. Since then, Binder has celebrated some major wins. She led Lime in […]

Mitsubishi UFJ’s co-GCs chiefs on why two heads are better than one

Since The Lawyer last interviewed Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group’s co-general counsels James Morgan and Prabhat Kumar in 2020, the globe has witnessed enough significant events to last a few decades. Specifically highlighting Covid-19, the Russia/Ukraine conflict, high inflation and the gilt crisis, the pair have focussed on how they adapt their team to cope with […]

Lloyd Thomas, Brighton and Hove

The Seagulls’ GC on the legal challenges of football

In 1997, Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club was one goal away from collapse. Now, 26 years later and the Seagulls are flying high in the Premier League and have negotiated the group stage of this season’s Europa League, in the first year they’ve ever played European football. Lloyd Thomas joined the club two years […]

BSH’s legal chief on dismantling stigma around Aspergers

Kevin Athow’s first job was making snooker tables in a factory in Lincolnshire. He later worked as a roadie, touring with bands for seven years. His first foray into law was during jury service, which inspired him to qualify as a barrister at 32. As routes in-house go, his is up there with the unconventional. […]

In-house interview: CDPQ’s legal head Alex Chmel

Canadian pension fund investor CDPQ’s location in London’s West End just by Carnaby Street is a deliberate part of the world’s second-largest infrastructure investor’s allure. The firm first launched in London in 2016 but moved to its new, swankily-located, concrete-ceilinged headquarters in January this year as part of a wider image overhaul. “We’ve been present […]