Senior Commercial Counsel, Nova Credit
$239-275.4k
Cross-border credit reporting
Be an early applicant
Cross-border credit reporting
101-200 employees
Be an early applicant
$239-275.4k
101-200 employees
Company mission
To inspire and facilitate the flow of human diversity, helping the world's moving population to arrive and thrive.
Role
Who you are
- 7+ years of relevant commercial and corporate law experience, with a strong preference for experience in-house and negotiating with big players
- You're admitted to a state bar (or eligible to register as in-house counsel)
- You're curious about (or already using) generative AI tools - we want someone who's excited about the future of legal tech
- You’ve partnered with Sales/Go To Market before, hopefully by embedding in the team
- You can take something complex and make it simple. You know how to pause, take a breath, and translate from lawyer-speak (e.g., all those acronyms) to something the audience in front of you will grasp
- You've been in the SaaS trenches with financial institutions, negotiating enterprise deals with banks, and knowing exactly why they obsess over data security addendums and compliance frameworks
- You have experience with the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), including negotiating agreements with or for Credit Reporting Agencies (CRAs)
- You've wrestled with data supply agreements - negotiating with aggregators and understanding the unique headaches (and opportunities) these partnerships create
- You’re curious, like a cat. Maybe your friends even call you “Whiskers.” You hear about something you don’t know, and you feel a need to learn it. You don’t need to know everything, but you will need to know how to use your resources (regulatory guidance, your network, Slack, journals, books, Bing, law firms) to find the answer to just about any question
What the job involves
- Nova Credit's small but mighty legal and compliance team drives company growth while ensuring we meet all legal, contractual, and regulatory requirements
- In our highly regulated industry, the team is essential to business strategy and operations
- You'll work cross-functionally, leveraging your legal and commercial expertise across all aspects of Nova Credit's business
- We're seeking a Senior Commercial Counsel (IC5) to join our legal team and help us navigate the world of contracts and negotiations as we scale globally
- You'll be the legal partner who makes complex deals happen, the translator who breaks down legalese into human speak, and the strategic thinker who helps us grow responsibly
- In this role, you'll be our deal-maker, negotiating with everyone from startups to Fortune 100 financial institutions
- You'll be part lawyer, part teacher, part business strategist, and full-time problem solver
- You’ll encounter challenging questions and need to provide thoughtful answers
- You’ll start with research and brainstorming
- For the toughest ones, you might consider phoning a friend, working with experts in the area, or asking Google (and extracting the correct information)
- Reporting directly to our General Counsel
- It involves influencing across departments, so knowing how to build trust and be a problem-solver (and presenting oneself as such) is critical
- WITHIN YOUR FIRST MONTH, YOU'LL:
- Get the lay of the land - understand our business model, key relationships, product offerings, and how we got here
- Understand Nova Credit’s business development lifecycle, legal involvement at various stages, and ongoing agreement negotiation
- Familiarize yourself with key regulatory and compliance frameworks (e.g., Fair Credit Reporting Act, CCPA)
- Get to know our working style, goals, mission, and values
- Get to know the people
- WITHIN YOUR FIRST QUARTER, YOU'LL:
- Dive deep into Nova Credit’s legal agreements and organizational structure
- Take the lead on customer negotiations, partnering closely with our business development team
- Lead review and negotiation of supplier and vendor agreements, translating lawyer-speak into sales-speak
- Structure, draft, review, and negotiate license agreements, letters of intent, term sheets, or other contractual documents to support complex commercial initiatives
- Review, edit, and negotiate documents like NDAs and vendor information forms
- Get to know the credit reporting and analysis industry (including bureaus, financial institutions, credit providers, and other fintechs)
- WITHIN YOUR FIRST YEAR, YOU'LL:
- Independently quarterback negotiations with major financial institutions
- Become a go-to person for "Hey, quick legal question..."
- Design and deliver training, teaching sales teams about caps, supercaps, data rights, IP, and why these things matter
- Build processes that make legal less of a bottleneck and more of an accelerator
- Experiment with GenAI tools to make our legal operations more efficient
Our take
For the 15 million new immigrants who arrive in the US each year, it’s crucial to have a working credit history. Without this, they’ll be unable to rent an apartment, apply for a credit card or in some cases even get a job. The issue is that their credit history won’t have travelled with them, so lenders in their new country won’t be able to verify their eligibility. Nova Credit's founders experienced this problem first-hand, as Esipov is a first-generation Russian immigrant.
Nova Credit imports financial histories to enable immigrants to set up lives in new countries, with their ‘Credit Passport’. This is a digital framework that connects an individual’s credit history information from one country into the country where they are currently residing.
Nova Credit is currently able to import credit history from 8 countries, its most recent addition being the UK in January 2023. Since being accepted to Y Combinator in 2016, the company has since raised considerable funding from major finance players such as HSBC. Nova Credit has grown its footprint significantly, covering more than 1 billion consumer credit profiles, with further expansion in sight.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
Company
Funding (last 2 of 4 rounds)
Oct 2023
$45m
SERIES C
Feb 2020
$50m
SERIES B
Total funding: $114.3m
Company benefits
- Free flight anywhere in the world on every anniversary
- Complementary wellness benefits, including Headspace and Ginger subscriptions
- $75/month contribution by Nova towards commuter benefits
- Dental and vision are 95% subsidized for Nova Credit employees, and 50% for dependents
- Unlimited paid time off policy
- $1500/year professional development budget
- Catered lunch on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays
- Health insurance
- SF / NY salaries across the US
- $50/month contribution by Nova Credit towards your cell phone bill
Company HQ
Financial District, San Francisco, CA
Leadership
Misha Esipov
(CEO)Previously Teaching Fellow at NYU Stern School of Business for 2 years and Investment Banker at Goldman Sachs for 3 years.
Nicky Goulimis
(Board Member)Previously worked for 3 years at Bain & Company, holding various positions such as Associate Consultant and Senior Associate Consultant. She served as COO until 2021.
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