About

Brent Irvin is one of the best-known GCs in China, and is often featured in the industry and commercial press for his interesting and highly successful approach to legal and business roles. Irvin’s role with Tencent was secured on the back of a distinguished career as a private practice lawyer specialising in corporate and M&A work in the technology sector; an ideal preparation for his in-house legal career with a Chinese investment holding company whose subsidiaries provide media, entertainment, internet and mobile phone value-added services and operate online advertising services. Joining Tencent in 2010, Irvin developed the legal team from scratch, into the current three-figure staff count, in order to keep pace with the company’s rapid domestic and international growth. Irvin also explains that he changed the structure of the department, ‘creating a team of “front line” product-support lawyers in addition to specialist teams such as litigation, IP and transactions’, in a move that allowed the team to tackle these various practice areas more effectively. Members of the legal department are grouped into six teams that deal with specific corporate functions or legal areas, such as e-commerce or IP, with the leaders of these teams reporting directly to Irvin. Organising the team this way was a conscious effort to emulate the structure Irvin worked with during his time with Palo Alto-based law firm Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. In order to pre-empt any potential risks before they emerge, Irvin has also created ‘a strong policy team that in addition to legislative analysis or lobbying also does more general policy work relating to the technological, economic and social impact of Tencent products’. In accordance with the company’s ethos, Irvin has fully embraced technology within the legal department, producing knowledge sharing software and tools to maximise the team’s efficiency in response to emerging challenges. His proactivity and innovation in legal matters also carries over to his extra-curricular activities, as he is a regular on the conference circuit speaking on matters ranging from intellectual property to internet regulation.