Ships and Tech: Placement at Wärtsilä, June 2019
Back in February, I (alongside my teammate from the University of Southampton, Chris Ireland) won the SCL Student Tech Law Challenge 2019, beating students from across the UK in a day-long event testing and developing legal skills within a tech environment. For more information, check out the article I wrote back in February. Since that time, the majority of my energy has been spent on my degree, with the end of year exams taking up the lives of everyone in my course for April and May.
However, I had something to look forward to. After being introduced to Tom Barr (the Area Counsel for Wärtsilä/Transas) it was arranged for me to go on placement at their offices in Portsmouth for a week in June. Wärtsilä are a global leader in the international marine and energy industries, founded in Helsinki, and the area I would be working in was Transas, a company which joined Wärtsilä recently, and who specialised in hardware and software for shipping companies to develop a smarter system in the marine industry. Before I arrived, this was essentially all the information I had, and I was unsure what to expect when I arrived at Southampton airport late Sunday evening.
I may have not known what to expect, but on arriving at the office complex on the outskirts of Portsmouth I felt ready to experience a week in a new place. The Wärtsilä/Transas office is located at what used to be the headquarters for IBM before they moved to Southampton. The complex itself is beautiful, with lots of green spaces and nature (including Canada geese) can be found all around. Despite the weather being questionable for the entire time I was here it was a nice break from inner city life with lots of space to take lunch outside or go for a walk to clear your head from office work.
The Legal Team at Wärtsilä itself were extremely friendly and welcoming as soon as I walked through the door. As an in-house team, the atmosphere was close and friendly, with only 4 lawyers being based in the Portsmouth Office. Alongside Tom, Catalina Dugard-Camacho, Rebecca Reed-Beale and Tatiana Sergeeva introduced me to their working environment as in-house lawyers, helping me with all my questions and encouraging me to be as involved in possible with their respective projects.
The week itself passed extremely quickly. I was given hands-on experience with each of the team members, working in different areas as varied as procurement and commercial developments to new technologies and training seminars. With such a small team, I was made to feel like I could genuinely contribute with my knowledge, especially around technology, to help develop the projects the team had in the works. I was given a number of tasks for the week, to research in aid of the different projects and to introduce me on a deeper level to the realities of in-house legal work.
Every day, one of the team members bought me lunch and I had an opportunity to learn more about their diverse backgrounds and respective career paths, as well as tell them a bit more about myself. I enjoyed the chance to connect on an individual level with people all further on than me in their careers, and everyone was more than willing to impart advice, tips and other information on how to continue to move forward in the world of law and tech.
As I signed an NDA (as is expected with any business protecting their interests) I can’t say much about the work I was doing, but I did enjoy a vast range of topics and insights especially in the field of technology law. I was able to work and learn about the topics which pervade our lives, including AI, cryptocurrency, blockchain, data requirements and all the other buzzwords that everyone hears but few seem to understand. I feel I have come away understanding a lot more than I did, and that is a massive positive. To have this in-house experience so early on in my legal experience has also been a great benefit, as I feel I can more clearly see the pros and cons to both firm work and in-house.
Overall, my experience in Portsmouth with Wärtsilä/Transas was extremely valuable and I feel very lucky that I was able to come down from Scotland to work with such hardworking and intelligent individuals on things that I am genuinely passionate about. The experience offered to me via the SCL and Wärtsilä was truly exceptional. Every single person at Wärtsilä went out of their way to make my time as comfortable, inclusive and enjoyable as possible and I am amazed at the time and energy they put into making my time in Portsmouth as brilliant as it has been.
I have written this article to reflect as such, and to hopefully provide an indication to future winners of the LawTech Challenge of the opportunities that can come with first prize. For full transparency, it is important to mention that I am lucky to be in a position in which I could afford to go down. While the company very kindly covered my food and transport to the airport, they could not cover more than that. I mention this not as a slight towards Wärtsilä, but in an effort to reflect the expense and commitment that even amazing prizes can require. My own ability to cover the travel and accommodation costs is a massive factor which could prevent others (equally as capable) from taking up these opportunities, especially if like me they come from as far as Scotland. I feel very, very lucky to have been able to take full advantage of the opportunity Wärtsilä provided, and I am incredibly grateful for the time, effort, and attention they paid to me, to make my experience as valuable as possible — not just in terms of expense, but in the knowledge they gave me about in-house work in law, technology and business more widely.
Thank you once again to the SCL for organising this opportunity, and for Wärtsilä for allowing me an insight into their inner workings. I am so grateful to everyone in the Legal team in Portsmouth for the experience, and look forward to using all the advice, help and inspiration they have provided to help develop further my interests in Tech Law in the future.
