Team size: Six

Could you share an example of a time when you came up with an innovation that improved how your legal team works and did not come at a large expense?   

We are constantly looking for ways to innovate within my legal team so that I can support my company’s main strategic goals and improve how my team operates internally and with other departments. Especially following the Covid-19 pandemic, it has proven particularly helpful to use automated task and note platforms in our daily routine. Two years ago, we initiated using Microsoft to Do and One Note and Teams within the legal team. These tools have brought excellent results as we have centralised online notes, managed tasks, collaborated with various platforms and deadlines efficiently, and shared contracts, information and presentations, bringing the legal department closer to other departments within our organisation, making our work quicker and more efficient. We have also adopted cloud usage (SharePoint and One Drive) to tackle the ‘always connected’ mandate that modern practices require. Keeping our team’s files in our SharePoint provided us with flexibility and adaptability to work on multiple files with multiple teams. All these practices have saved us time and costs and helped our team streamline our legal review and our companies’ internal processes.   

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

In July 2022, Seanergy Maritime Holdings Corp. completed the spin-off of its subsidiary, United Maritime Corp., the shares of which began trading in the Nasdaq Capital Market. United Maritime was established as a spin-off entity to follow an opportunistic & sector-agnostic investment strategy. I and the company’s legal team successfully ran this project from a legal standpoint for more than six months. We were engaged in various tasks, including reviewing and filing the necessary registration statements with the Securities and Exchange Commission, brainstorming on the new company’s structure from a corporate governance and management perspective, and drafting all the agreements, many of which included bespoke provisions. It is noteworthy that apart from the dry bulk capesize fleet that Seanergy had already been operating, the legal team also started doing legal work on United’s tanker fleet as well as its kamsarmax and panamax vessels by handling all the sale and purchase transactions, the vessels’ financing documentation and the daily legal representation needed. With the legal teams’ representation, the company’s management further completed a public offering with proceeds of USD$26.0m. It is important to stress here that United, through its operations during the period from Q3 2022 to the end of Q1 2023, recorded total net revenues of USD$19.8m and a total income of USD$33.3m, while realised accounting profit of USD$50.2m coming from the sale of its previously acquired four tanker vessels. Within this first year of operations, United entered into 16 vessel purchase and sale transactions of more than USD$200 m. This has resulted in United standing out as a spin-off company’s success story, reaching many milestones in less than a year since starting its operations. 

How important is choosing to work with external lawyers who align with your company’s values? Are you likely to reconsider what firms you work with based on this?    

Legal expertise is essential for us when choosing our external lawyers. Equally important to our company is finding a balance between legal proficiency and shared values, as it leads to a more productive and harmonious working relationship. We have always worked with external lawyers with whom we share the same principles. We always try to ensure that legal strategies support our broader goals, and we strive to communicate openly and collaborate with our third-party legal counsels while getting tailored advice. Reconsidering any law firms, we have worked with based on their alignment with our company’s values is a strategic management decision. I usually seek recommendations from other lawyers in the industry and have conversations in advance with potential law firms, as understanding their ethics and approach to legal matters is a decisive factor.