Head of Legal

MinIO is the industry leader in high-performance object storage and the company behind the world’s fastest, most widely deployed object store, powering production infrastructure for more than half of the Fortune 500, including 9 of the 10 largest global automakers and all 10 of the largest U.S. banks. Our enterprise offering, AIStor, is engineered to handle the scale, speed, and pressure of modern AI and analytics workloads—from terabytes to exabytes—all in a single namespace.

MinIO is hiring a Head of Legal to own the full legal function for a fast-growing, global infrastructure software company. The core of this role is go-to-market — you'll be the legal counterpart to a high-velocity enterprise sales organization, driving contract execution across complex deals while building scalable processes for the long term. You'll also cover IP, privacy, compliance, and operations as a hands-on individual contributor who gets things done.

Commercial & Contracts

• Lead all corporate legal matters including commercial, product, privacy, compliance, and governance.
• Draft, review, and negotiate customer, partner, vendor, and licensing agreements — enterprise software contract experience is a must.
• Establish and maintain company wide policies, contract templates, and legal playbooks — including customer-friendly “plain English” terms, response-time SLAs for sales teams, and a standard concessions playbook that can be applied by non-lawyer personnel.
• Support the board and executive team on governance, risk, and strategic initiatives; prepare the company for financings and audits.
• Partner with a global sales organization on enterprise deal negotiation and contract execution.
• Build streamlined partner contracting processes with separate templates for each partner type (technology integrations, joint marketing, resellers, lead referrals); support procurement with vendor contract guidelines, checklists, and templates.

Operations & Partnerships

• Manage outside counsel relationships and legal budget with efficiency and accountability; engage specialist outside counsel as needed for specific projects (litigation, employment, securities, regulatory, international).
• Collaborate cross-functionally with Sales, HR, Marketing, and Engineering as a trusted day-to-day partner.
• Provide employment law guidance in partnership with the HR team, including fast, practical advice on urgent employee relations matters, complaints, and involuntary terminations.

• JD from an accredited law school and active bar membership.
• 8+ years of relevant legal experience, ideally a mix of law firm and in-house roles.
• Proven experience supporting global sales organizations on enterprise-level contract negotiations — ideally within SaaS, infrastructure software, data platforms, or AI/ML industries.
• Strong commercial contracting skills with demonstrated enterprise software license experience.
• Working knowledge of privacy and data protection frameworks including GDPR and CCPA.
• Comfortable operating as a hands-on individual contributor in a fast-paced, high-growth environment.
• Prior experience as a first legal hire or sole in-house counsel at a startup or growth-stage company.
• Background in high-growth or venture-backed companies.
• Experience advising on employment matters in partnership with HR.