The Company
Our client is a Hong Konglisted precision diagnostics scaleup company looking for an additional lawyer to become the deputy Legal team lead either in Singapore or HK. Their operations span across Singapore, Hong Kong and China and their culture is founderled; agile, and fastmoving where business evolves quickly with market demands. Autonomy will be high for this role within a team of 4 and reporting into a corporate governance head. Hybrid working applies (typically four days onsite in Singapore), with flexibility increasing over tenure. Regular monthly travel to Hangzhou, Shenzhen, and Hong Kong is expected to be engaged with the business.
Responsibilities
- Primary Legal Partner to the Business: Own daytoday legal support across the company as the hiring manager transitions to a clientfacing role; act as the central point for legal matters spanning corporate, commercial, regulatory, and postlisting obligations.
- Commercial Contracts (Chinese & English): Review, draft, and negotiate a broad range of agreements (e.g., R&D collaborations, supply/manufacturing, clinical research, licensing, vendor and distribution). Many counterparties and documents are in Chinesenativelevel reading/writing is required.
- Corporate Governance & ListedCompany Compliance: Advise on board/committee processes, disclosure obligations, securities compliance, and continuing obligations of a Hong Konglisted issuer; coordinate closely with the large Compliance function.
- M&A and Strategic Transactions: Lead/support buyside and sellside activities, joint ventures, strategic partnerships, and crossborder deals (including diligence, structuring, negotiating, and integration).
- Capital Markets & Financing: Support latestage fundraising rounds and multijurisdiction capital markets initiatives; partner with Finance/CFO on documentation, disclosure, and governance controls.
- Intellectual Property Oversight: Manage and instruct external patent counsel on filings, portfolio strategy, licensing, and IP risk mitigation; maintain a solid conceptual grasp of IP without needing deep technical expertise.
- Risk & Regulatory: Identify and mitigate legal risks across data protection, clinical/diagnostics regulatory frameworks, manufacturing/supply chain, and crossborder operations; establish pragmatic guardrails that enable speed without compromising compliance.
- CrossFunctional Partnering: Embed with R&D, Regulatory, Commercial, Operations, and Corporate Affairs to provide businesssavvy, solutionoriented advice; translate fastchanging plans into actionable legal paths.
- External Counsel Management: Select, brief, and manage law firms (PRC, Hong Kong, and international), driving efficiency, quality, and cost control.
- Team Leadership & Scale: Mentor the Legal Executive and Company Secretary in Singapore; help refine processes as the function restructures; build scalable templates, playbooks, and reporting.
Requirements
- Qualified lawyer with strong postqualification experience (>8PQE) in corporate/commercial work; inhouse exposure at a fastgrowth or founderled company is a plus.
- Demonstrated track record in M&A and crossborder transactions; experience with listedcompany governance/securities compliance is highly advantageous.
- Comfortable overseeing IP portfolios via external counsel and handling licensing/technology agreements.
- Admission in Singapore or another commonlaw jurisdiction preferred; multijurisdiction experience (China/Hong Kong) valued.
- Bilingual fluency in Mandarin and English (spoken and written) is mandatory; ability to review/draft/negotiate contracts in Chinese is essential as manufacturing and business operations are based in China.
- Willing and able to travel monthly to Mainland China and Hong Kong (or Singapore if from HK/China); openness to ongoing regional travel thereafter.
- Businessoriented, pragmatic advisor who balances speed with control in a rapid, planevolving environment.
- Strong negotiation, stakeholder management, and executive communication skills; comfortable engaging Csuite leaders.
- High ownership and autonomy; able to prioritize multiple matters and build simple, scalable processes.
- Resilient and adaptable, with excellent judgment under time pressure; thrives in a startup/scaleup phase postIPO.
- Core legal capabilities are paramount (M&A in particular); industry specialization can be learned on the job.
