About

Valérie Ruotolo has served as country counsel in Italy for multinational information technology company HP since 2015, and although it is her first in-house role, she became head of legal affairs for Italy after only a year and a half. ‘Since HP is my first in-house role and I was coming from private practice, I had to learn to be a good in-house lawyer, adapt quickly to the company work, become a trusted advisor of the business and a manager of the team of colleagues, which I succeeded’ says Ruotolo. As the head of the legal department in the country, she provides support to the business and to other global functions in a wide array of legal topics and also serves as secretary of the board of directors, with her involvement required in several projects at EMEA and worldwide levels. Over the years she served in capacity of legal lead, overseeing the 2015 separation of HP into two different and independent companies: HP Enterprise and HP Inc. For this fundamental project, Ruotolo was responsible for the M&A work at a local level, coordinating the work of the functions and of the external counsel. Her involvement in local activities related to the HP acquisition of the printing business from Samsung also stands out, a deal that started in 2016 and concluded in November 2017. Besides her work at HP she became a member of ACC and AIGI, an association of business lawyers, where she spoke at several important legal conferences and wrote legal articles in law reviews. Before joining HP, Ruotolo was a member of the Milan Bar for more than ten years practicing civil and competition law for Italian and foreign clients within international law firms, such as Nascimbene & Partners and Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton in both the Brussels and Milan offices, where she gained experience in litigation, corporate and commercial law.