What are the most significant cases and transactions that you have been involved in over the past year?

Hinduja Group is a global conglomerate operating for over a century with a multi-billion-dollar turnover in a dozen business verticals with more than 150 thousand people working in 50+ countries. Since the group has business verticals in the areas of automotive, lubricants, banking, hospitality, information technology and healthcare, to name a few, there are continuous business expansions throughout the year. As president (legal) and general counsel in the group’s global headquarters in London, I am involved in providing strategic and legal advice to various businesses throughout the year.

In 2023, our IT group acquired companies in various jurisdictions in the USA, Europe and Asia. Though the M&A started sometime back, they were operationalised in 2023 – 2024. In 2023, the Group completed its development of The Old War Office Hotel and residential projects in London. This ultra luxury hotel is being managed by the Raffles group, which is an internationally known brand. They are managing it under the ownership of the group. The project has developed several super luxury residences being marketed presently. This was a complex project which took more than six years to complete costing around $1.2bn making the hotel and residences operational was a daunting task especially when the structuring of the project was done in multiple jurisdictions considering the operational and tax efficiency. I sit on the board of directors of most of the project companies and provide strategic and legal advice throughout. The group has also pushed for its electric vehicle manufacturing in the UK and India in a big way by creating operational facilities in 2023. I’m involved in structuring and operationalising the manufacturing companies.

What innovations have you made to the way your legal team works in the past year?

The legal department in London is pivotal in advising various businesses of the group. Speed, quality and accuracy are the key parameters in decision making. To maintain these qualities continuously throughout the year was a challenge. We, therefore, concentrated on improvement in productivity and multitasking. In the current year we have concentrated on analysing problems or issues and have offered solutions faster than what we delivered in earlier years. Continuous in-house training and experiments have helped us in achieving them.

Based on your experience, what is the key to collaborating successfully with business partners?

Any business is driven by commercial decisions. However, the commercial perspective alone won’t produce successful results unless there is a healthy dialogue with the business partners. Such dialogues should be based on honesty, transparency and be driven by consistent efforts to maintain a balanced approach throughout. The key to a successful collaboration is to consider and protect the interest of both the parties.

Which political, economic or regulatory changes have impacted your work the most in the past year?

Global regulatory changes have become never-ending. The compliance regime is getting tougher and tougher. Cross country complianceis becoming critical and challenging day by day. With the ongoing war in Europe and Middle East, geopolitical risks have assumed critical importance. With geopolitical risks come international sanctions and its compliance has always been challenging.

In a global business like ours, operating in various business sectors across the globe, compliance of international sanctions becomes critical as their breaches may trigger enormous problems for the businesses. In 2023, the main challenges were assessing and mitigating geopolitical risks and never-ending regulatory changes. On the economic front, cost of living crisis hit many countries, and we were required to bring efficiency to lower our costs to market our products. This was a big challenge.

Apart from legal matters, has the team worked on other company initiatives you would like What is a cause, business-related or otherwise, that you are passionate about, and why?

I love mentoring youngsters, which I do regularly. I believe that knowledge is for sharing and spreading. I did the same throughout the year 2023 which gave me a lot of personal satisfaction. I believe that knowledge is a two-way traffic- you share it, and you gain it simultaneously. I am involved in the think tank of International Chamber of Commerce and Corporate Counsel Forum of the International Bar Association. I am also on the advisory board of Queen Mary University in London and on the Executive Board of the Confederation of Indian Industries, UK. All these are rewarding professionally. In the last year I also spoke at many international seminars around the world and wrote several articles.