About

The Indian subsidiary of German multinational sportswear company adidas contains a top class legal team that has been influential in steering its business through a relatively rocky period. This is connected with taking Reebok India – that had suffered a financial fraud in the past – to posting a net profit in the financial year 2016. A team of 10 staff comprised of eight lawyers and two non-lawyers, Pulin Kumar, senior director – legal and compliance states that the team has ‘worked on an ethos to create an environment which has helped the organisation to take controlled risks striving to protect and enhance the group’s assets, reputation and interests’. Working in ‘close collaboration’ with the CEO and senior management to achieve these goals, the team also sits in on board meetings regularly and can point to a number of impressive accomplishments in the last few years. One example of these is the legal team’s instrumental role in getting the first approval for a single brand retail trade from the FIPB, as well as the team’s handling of multiple litigation proceedings related to financial fraud. The team has been at the forefront of the creation and implementation of a ‘robust compliance ecosystem for better corporate governance and monitoring of compliance activities within the company. Compliance responsibilities have been decentralized throughout the organization to maintain hygiene and to inculcate compliance as a habit within the organisation’. Vivek Tyagi who leads the litigation practice, Hemant Kumar Singh, who leads the secretarial practice for the organisation and Ritu Gupta, being the most experienced member of the legal team has been a great support the business in terms of legacy and historical developments in the organisation.