About

Having joined AGCO in 2000, Roger Batkin has extensive knowledge of the world-leading agricultural solution provider’s operations, which he draws upon as the company’s senior vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary. He has steadily increased his remit at AGCO; having been hired initially as European legal counsel, he was promoted to director of legal services for Europe Africa and Middle East (EAME) in 2004 adding coverage of Asia Pacific, Australia and New Zealand just two years later. Batkin states this journey has allowed him to benefit from ‘a wealth of international experience [in relation to] cultures, businesses, networks and legal issues among others – all very relevant as AGCO is a highly international operation’. Another key feature of his time at AGCO is Batkin’s prolific transactional work, having handled all M&A in the company over the last 18 years. This comprises of over 30 acquisitions or joint ventures in multiple jurisdictions in China, Europe, North and South America – providing detailed knowledge of each acquisition and the global business as a whole. The most recent and significant transactions he’s worked on include AGCO’s multimillion-dollar acquisitions of Precision Planting from Monsanto, Cimbria from Silverfleet Capital and Lely’s forage technology business. Batkin is also credited for having overseen a number of key and essential changes within his legal department: ‘The legal department has evolved tremendously in respect of the scope, depth, breadth and outreach of the department. In addition, I have introduced a greater risk management within the department both by empowering the team to be more strategic and also moving resource into compliance from the legal services team. Globally, there is a wider focus on regulatory issues – the regulation that surrounds businesses around the world has increased. Accordingly, the requirement for regulatory compliance has needed to increase’.