What are the most significant cases or transactions that you have been involved in over the past year?
As a part of Air Liquide group, a world leader in industrial gasses, our company continues to make deep contributions to the development of every industry including semiconductor and hydrogen, and our team has been dedicated to several significant transactions, deals and projects for such contributions. A few remarkable examples are: the project related to the expansion of gas supply in Kumamoto to align with the growth of the semiconductor industry; and the partnership with the Japanese leading energy company for collaboration on accelerating the development of low-carbon hydrogen in Japan and contributing to the energy transition.

Based on your experience, what is the key to collaborating successfully with business partners?
I believe building a healthy and trusting relationship is one of the key elements of collaborating successfully with business partners, both internal business clients and external partners. Legal team should understand the business, visions and core values to provide the better legal services to the internal business clients and introduce them to external partners for their better understanding of the company’s business needs. Legal team is also encouraged to provide strategic advice with the business clients by suggesting not only associated risks but also multiple scenarios and actions to drive the business. It may take time to develop a trusting relationship, but it must bring greater value to the company.

Are the effects of AI on the legal world overplayed, or underplayed?
It is indubitable that AI offers opportunities to optimise productivity, streamline our traditional way of working and transform the legal world. Especially, generative AI such as ChatGPT can be a “game changer” of business operations including legal.

However, I believe many lawyers are aware that decision making in the legal areas requires judgements considering complex and multi-layered matters surrounding the subject and therefore “human in loop” will remain crucial for the decision making. What will be required for us as successful legal professionals would be possessing not only legal skills but also accountability, ethics, integrity, and trustworthiness to enable appropriate decision making.