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

Panasonic Energy was established in late 2021 as part of a reorganisation undertaken by the Panasonic Group. Panasonic Energy is quite unique in that, prior to the restructuring, the battery business was spread across a number of different business units, so the restructuring was really a fresh start for the company and the business.

The legal team has handled several significant cases, these include restructuring-related matters, such as the acquisition of the legacy Sanyo battery business. We have also been involved in commercial transactions, such as the publicised transactions with Lucid and the construction of the Kansas factory. My team has also handled regulatory matters, including compliance with support with governmental relations.

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

While this is still very much a work in progress, the legal team continues to pursue initiatives to improve the efficiency and transparency of the way the PEC operates. For example, the PEC Legal Centre has taken the opportunity of the spin-off to review a number of unwritten business processes and continues to improve them by adopting a computer system for better project management and data-driven evaluation. There is little point in introducing new systems and processes if they are limited to a single function, for example the PEC Legal Centre. Therefore, the ongoing challenge is to link this system with other systems used within the PEC to enhance user adoption.

In summary, the innovation that continues to improve the way we work is the change in our mindset. From not just doing a good job, but to look for and find ways to continuously improve how the legal team can support the functioning of the company, for example, increased efficiency and effective data collection.

How important is choosing to work with external lawyers who align with your company’s values?

This is remarkably important, and I have asked my team to place a new emphasis on it when choosing outside counsel. The Panasonic Group has a very long and proud history and philosophy of business and corporate management. This is a nice way of saying that Panasonic can seem difficult to understand unless you try to understand the corporate culture which is firmly based in the philosophy of our founder, Konosuke Matsushita.

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

In order to build a strong relationship with your business partners in-house lawyers must learn their language, they must care about their concerns and their results, and most importantly, in-house lawyers should remain humble.