What are the most significant cases or transactions that your legal team has recently been involved in?

As highlights of the past year:

– General contractual support for aircraft sales and sales finance (American Airlines, Porter Airlines, Alaska Airlines, Binter, TUI, CIAF, SalamAir) and services contracts (LOT Polish Airlines, Nordic Aviation Capital, German Airways, Envoy Air), with more than US$2bn in revenue in 2022;
– Restructuring of entire legal support of OGMA, an Embraer’s subsidiary in Portugal who offers MRO services for a wide range of commercial, executive and defense aircraft, components and engines (with more than US$200mn in revenue in 2022);
– Development of new legal solutions to simplify the sale of integrated services solutions with application of visual law and legal design concepts;
– Development of new legal contractual infrastructure for Embraer new aircraft projects (P2F, Turbo-Prop, Energia);
– Development of new processes for dealing with the outbreak of bankruptcies, restructurings, and other credit disruptions in the market due to the pandemic and other business constraints;
– Legal support for a myriad of problems out of supply chain disruptions under the effects of the pandemic and the Ukrainian conflict;
– Execution of internal contractual carve-out of Embraer Commercial Aviation for the previously intended transaction with another OEM, and subsequent reintegration of the Commercial Aviation back to Embraer;
– Legal support for Embraer’s entrance in the air freight market with the launch of the E190F/E195F Passenger to Freight Conversions (P2F), designed to meet the changing demands of e-commerce and modern trade;
– Negotiation of a US$1.5bn financing program for Embraer’s regional aircraft with Apollo (NYSE: APO).

As we live in a fast-paced world today, what skills will a corporate legal team need to succeed in the modern in-house industry?

Mastering the business (beyond simply understanding it), keeping a true open mind (in constant search for out-of-the-box solutions), being deeply creative (when inspired by other areas of knowledge) and acting as a team player (with proper deference to all employees involved) are all desired skills to the modern in-house industry. The modern world brings the unknown closer and closer, and I believe the best way to deal with it is to start from scratch creating new tailored solutions. All recent events confirmed that the unforeseen and the black swans will happen and that we are past the time when having knowledge of past solutions was enough to successfully move forward. The classic copy and paste methodology are no longer a viable solution. But creating such new solutions requires starting from basic legal principles and truly mastering the business, its challenges and underlying operation, while considering all sides involved in a sustainable manner. A lawyer that masters the business can become more than a lawyer, acting as a true collaborator for the company’s success.

How do you suggest in-house lawyers build strong relationships with business partners?

I believe strong and sustainable relationships are built over a partnership attitude and effective results. A partnership attitude comes from actively listening to others, having an open mind, integrity and pursuing excellence, all while being courteous, professional and smart. Results will come from being useful to and by contributing to the company’s and everyone else’s success by offering new creative solutions, or by just being quick, or by identifying the risks not worth running. In all cases, the more the in-house lawyer understands the business, the more capable he/she will be in offering useful guidance or support. Business partners will always feel respected by lawyers who truly understand the challenges, perspectives and successes of their business partners.