Principal Legal Counsel - Technology & Software

Ocado Group is an equal opportunities employer and as such makes every effort to ensure that all potential employees are treated fairly and equally, regardless of their sex, sexual orientation, marital status, race, colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin, religion or belief, age, or disability or union membership status.

Are you a distinguished commercial or technology lawyer seeking a high-impact, strategic role? Ocado  invites you to step into a position where your expertise will drive innovation and shape our business's future.

About us

Ocado is a technology-led, global software and robotics platform providing a unique end-to-end solution for customers on a global scale. As part of growing the Ocado business, we have recently announced a new mission Ocado Intelligence Automation (OIA) to sell our unique ASRS (Automated Storage and Retrieval System) product to organisations operating outside of grocery e-commerce across the globe.

About the role

The focus of this role is to partner with the Ocado Intelligent Automation (OIA) business to provide strategic legal advice in respect of domestic and international transactions and facilitate the development of business strategies, whilst also providing legal and risk management expertise.

In addition, working together with the Associate General Counsel, the Principal Legal Counsel (OIA) will be responsible for providing support to stakeholders across the OIA business and key collaborators - including at an executive level.

The Principal Legal Counsel (OIA) will also be required to participate in, support and represent the Associate General Counsel at senior leadership and management forums.

What you'll be doing

• Being a trusted strategic partner for key stakeholders, including members of the executive team and be the go-to subject matter expert for all commercial legal matters for the OIA business.
• Proactively identifying legal changes that could impact our operations as well as strategic priorities for the business and work with the relevant stakeholders to agree solutions and take responsibility to achieve advantageous outcomes for the business.
• Takes a leading role in managing, coaching and developing and managing junior members of the team to deliver high quality and commercial advice to the OIA business (and where applicable Ocado Group) business in a timely manner.
• Leading and supervising drafting, negotiation and advice provided in respect of new and existing international OIA contracts (and where applicable Ocado Group).
• Overseeing all legal input in respect of drafting, negotiation and providing expert advice on a wide range of domestic and cross border commercial work in respect of contracts in support of the OIA business (and where applicable the Ocado Group), including:
• technology and hardware procurement arrangements including supply and/or manufacture agreements
• technology design appointments
• IT procurement including appointment of cloud services, SaaS and IT licences
• Global integrator arrangements
• IP matters including collaboration agreements, licensing and cross-licensing
• Data protection matters including data protection agreements and advice 
• logistics and distribution agreements; and
• general procurement of goods and services.
• Has a well-developed pragmatic and customer focussed approach to risk management.
• Anticipating, identifying and advising on IP, competition and data protection issues in the context of commercial and technology contracts and working collaboratively with the Compliance and Regulatory and IP teams on relevant matters;
• Ensuring compliance with corporate governance (including competition/antitrust policies) as part of any transaction
• Anticipating, identifying, advising and managing disputes, construction/property, employment, corporate and financing issues in the context of OIA (and where applicable Ocado Group). Work collaboratively with the Disputes, Employment, Construction and Corporate Legal team on relevant matters to support the OIA business.
• Building and developing strong relationships with external counsel and manage those relationships effectively from a delivery, risk and cost perspective on a daily basis.
• Contributing to the development of the Legal team’s strategy and proactively maintain and raise the profile of the team by developing and taking forward team initiatives/objectives.
• Developing and providing training and legal updates to the OIA business (and where applicable Ocado Group) on various areas of the law and regulatory matters.
• Responsible for the creation, development and update of standard contract templates and know-how materials for the OIA business (and where applicable Ocado Group).
• Contributes to developing more efficient legal systems and operations that impacts the function and looks for opportunities to improve e.g. automation or smarter in-house legal working.
• Support and management of legal budget in respect of OIA operations globally.
• Supporting, coaching and developing the wider Legal team to fulfil their potential and to deliver quality advice.

About You

• Minimum of 10 years post-qualification as a commercial or technology lawyer. Candidates outside this range who demonstrate their ability to perform the role are welcome.
• Qualifications: Qualified Solicitor/Barrister specialising in commercial and technology contracts. Ideally trained with a leading law firm or in-house team.
• Expertise: Experience advising on commercial and technology law internationally, with a desire to expand this expertise. Strong IP and data protection knowledge.
• Leadership: Proven experience working with senior management, including executive and board levels, in complex environments.
• Skills: Exceptional domestic and cross-border transactional experience. Outstanding business judgement and client counselling skills. Strong academic background.

What we offer you

Our employee benefits are designed for you, we care about people and we’ve ensured we have a wealth of benefits that focus on your well-being. We regularly review our benefits to ensure we are supporting our employees appropriately.

• 30 days ‘working from anywhere in the world’ policy 
• Wellbeing support through dedicated apps and an Employee Assistance Programme 
• 25 days annual leave, rising to 27 days after 5 years service (plus optional holiday purchase)
• Pension scheme (various options available including employer contribution matching up to 7%)
• Generous Private Medical Insurance (within the first month of joining!)
• Income Protection (can be up to 50% of salary for 3 years) and Life Assurance (3 x annual salary) 
• 22 weeks paid maternity leave and 6 weeks paid paternity leave (once relevant service requirements complete) 
• Train Ticket loan (interest-free)
• Cycle to Work Scheme
• Free shuttle bus to and from Hatfield Train Station to the Hatfield offices 
• Free shuttle bus to and from Welwyn Garden City Train Station to the Welwyn Garden City offices
• Opportunity to participate in Sharesave and Buy as You Earn share schemes
• 15% discount on Ocado.com and free delivery for all employees (within the first month of joining!