Team size: Four – three attorneys-at-law and one legal assistant

Major legal advisers: Bech-Bruun

Can you give an idea of the most significant cases or transactions that your legal team has recently been involved in?

We advise on all legal aspects to support the business across various jurisdictions. This comprises contract negotiations, compliance and regulatory matters, general legal advice, and M&A. Over recent years, the legal team has supported over ten acquisitions and investments across all Royal Unibrew’s markets in Denmark, Norway, Italy, Finland, Sweden, and Canada. Consequently, M&A forms a significant part of the support to the business’ growth strategy and larger transformational acquisitions in new geographies. The legal team supports the M&A agenda throughout the process – in defining targets, deal strategy, due diligence, negotiations of purchase agreements and ancillary agreements, closing and post-closing integration.

How has the increasing consciousness of climate change and sustainability affected your company and the team’s priorities?

Sustainability is a top priority to the business and consequently, important to the legal team. The legal team actively supports the agenda by thinking sustainability into the daily work and operations and serving as a trusted advisor to the business’ group CSR team, by providing concrete advice on group policies as well as various CSR related projects, including being the driving force behind the execution the business’ recently installed 10 MW solar park right next to its Danish production facility.

If you had to give advice to an aspiring in-house lawyer or general counsel, what would it be and why?

Adding value to the business is key. This requires business acumen, focus on operational, pragmatic, and to-the-point advice. To succeed, you need to be curious and ask questions and have a commercial mindset. Non-legal colleagues love to talk about their jobs while preparing the legal team to provide tailormade and operational support. Being an in-house lawyer at Royal Unibrew means providing legal advice on various legal areas, including marketing law, competition law, contracts and contracts drafting, compliance, ESG and CSR, among others. Being curious about the legal framework and being insistent on uncovering the commercial as well as practical issues, concerns and challenges is vital.

The legal department should never be seen as a hindrance to the business but should be taken as a co-player and trusted advisor, providing valuable commercial input as well as proactively driving the business agendas – a position which Royal Unibrew’s legal team has cemented by the inclusion of the group general counsel to the group leadership team.

The unusual business environment created by the pandemic has been swiftly followed by the Ukraine crisis, and attendant supply chain costs rising and rising inflation. Are you now putting more emphasis on preparing for the unforeseen and, if so, what does this entail?

Being a manufacturing business, the rise in supply chain costs and inflation have impacted Royal Unibrew in numerous ways, and have led the entire organisation to rethink procedures, strategies and workstreams.

For the legal team this has involved more knowledge sharing between the legal teams across the business’ different markets) and assisting the business with consolidating and optimising its production capabilities and capacities.