Team size:  circa 250 

What significant projects or deals has the legal team worked on in the past year?  Can you provide examples of successful outcomes or major accomplishments? 

LSEG/Microsoft Partnership: In December 2022, the Legal and Compliance team led negotiations for LSEG’s transformational multi-billion pound, 10-year strategic partnership with Microsoft for next-generation data and analytics and cloud infrastructure solutions.  As part of the transaction, Microsoft also acquired a 4% stake in LSEG and Scott Guthrie, Microsoft’s EVP for AI/Cloud, joined LSEG’s board. The partnership is transforming the way customers discover, analyse and trade securities around the world, advancing LSEG’s cloud strategy, building improved resilience and agility, and enabling innovation through AI. This ground-breaking transaction required a multi-disciplinary, highly collaborative team approach, with significant internal/external stakeholder engagement, including LSEG’s key regulators.  Eighteen months on from the deal signing, the legal team continues to provide integral strategic support to the partnership – from supporting the governance and operationalisation of the partnership, to enabling timely product launches. 

Selldown of Blackstone consortium shares: As a result of the Refinitiv transaction, a consortium of investors led by Blackstone became the largest shareholder in LSEG, owning approximately 36% of shares in the Group. A structured exit was agreed at the time of the deal. The Corporate Legal team supported the strategic exit of Blackstone on an accelerated timetable, enabling a landmark transaction involving over GBP 16 bn of equity sold into the market, the first-ever Jumbo Sponsor Secondary Accelerated Equity Offering to price at a premium globally.  

Driving growth through innovation and use of technology: Many in-house legal teams grapple with the overhead and technology choices when deciding how to manage contracts.  Since 2014, the LSEG Legal team took the, then innovative, approach to outsource all contracts to a managed legal service provider for certain areas of LSEG’s business, promoting a faster and more efficient service. 

Following the acquisition of Refinitiv, the team has overhauled LSEG’s contracting approach, in particular, expanding the scope of managed legal services (MLS), actively engaging with and training business colleagues, implementing a fully integrated digital platform with real-time contracting workflow and data, and proactively identifying and addressing bottlenecks on a theme-by-theme basis. This has enabled LSEG to reduce the number of days in its average sales contract cycle by 40%, driving greater revenue growth. 

Leveraging their in-house custom-built platform, the Legal and Compliance Hub, the team have the ability to generate management information (MI) to better understand trends and themes. The Hub has integration with the e-billing platform to track external counsel spend on matters, it links to the Client Onboarding infrastructure to capture alerts relating to Sanctions and other KYC data and connects to our legal support provider managing contracts with real-time updates on contract stages and completion. The Legal and Compliance team has been recognised as the 2023 Most Transformative In-House Team (Legal Business Awards) – largely in recognition of the transformative strategic partnership with Microsoft signed in December 2022. 

Apart from legal matters, has the team worked on other company initiatives? 

LSEG was among the first in-house legal teams to sign up for the UK’s In House Pro Bono Pledge in 2024. The Pledge is a way for companies to publicly demonstrate their commitment to pro bono work and to take practical steps to ensure their legal teams can make a pro bono contribution.  The legal team has a target to involve 25% of all team members in volunteering by the end of 2024 and is pursuing this target through a combination of initiatives including working with charities sponsored by LSEG as well as partnering with external adviser Freshfields on pro bono initiatives.  

The Legal and Compliance Team leverages relationships with a wide range of external firms to ensure they remain experts across all relevant topics. Using this learning and expertise, the team lead training and awareness sessions on AI risks, sustainability, and use of sanctions by authorities among others.  The team deliver sessions to LSEG Divisional Leadership teams and regulators, helping the business to identify risks and follow up on opportunities.   

The legal team have been at the forefront of AI governance, launching the LSEG AI Playbook to guide the Group through a streamlined AI governance approach. The team has delivered multiple training sessions on AI risks to Divisional Leadership Teams. Through this work, the Group can deliver products to market quickly while maintaining focus on key risks. 

Catherine Johnson, LSEG Group General Counsel, is the Executive Committee sponsor for LSEG’s equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) employee networks and specifically sponsors LSEG’s Women Inspired Network (WIN). Many members of the Legal team have been inspired by Catherine’s leadership and have become advocates of EDI both internally and externally, leading internal Employee Resource Groups and speaking on external panels on a range of EDI topics. 

How does the legal team collaborate with other departments within the company?  

The combined Legal and Compliance team is 250 strong and located in approximately 30 countries.  The team has influence over the entire organisation being matrix-aligned to the Group’s business divisions and sitting on respective Divisional Leadership Teams, ensuring that the Legal and Compliance team operates at the centre of strategic decision-making, enabling it to add commercial value and strategic insight.