Microsoft has promoted Jonathan Palmer to chief legal officer, replacing Hossein Nowbar who left the company this month.
Palmer was previously the tech giant’s general counsel. His expanded responsibilities will see him oversee the company’s core legal and compliance functions, covering litigation, labour and employment, trade and export controls, antitrust, immigration, corporate governance, M&A, IP, compliance and legal business operations.
Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft is the world’s second largest company by market capitalisation, valued at about $3.8trn.
Palmer originally joined Microsoft in 2010 as a senior attorney from Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe, where he was a partner. At Microsoft, he quickly worked his way up the ranks to assistant GC, associate GC and then deputy GC and head of litigation, a role he held until being promoted to GC in 2023.
Prior to his time at Orrick, Palmer spent 12 years at defunct firm Heller Ehrman, including a spell as managing shareholder for the firm’s Asia practice. He also previously worked at defunct firm Brobeck Phleger & Harrison and legacy Bell Rosenberg & Hughes.
Nowbar, meanwhile, exits after two years in the CLO role, having also previously been GC. At the time, he replaced Lisa Tanzi in the CLO role, who retired after almost three decades with the company. Nowbar had been with the company since 1997, when he joined as an in-house attorney from Davis Wright Tremaine.
Writing on LinkedIn, he said: “After 20+ years at Microsoft, I am closing one of the most meaningful chapters of my career. When I joined as a young attorney, I was inspired by the promise of the personal computer and the internet. Since then, I’ve had the privilege of helping the company grow from ‘a computer on every desk and in every home’ to ‘empower every person and every organisation on the planet to achieve more’.”
He said his goal for the next stage of his career is to help organisations embrace disruptive technologies responsibly and sustainably to drive economic and societal impact, without giving further details.
He added: “I want to thank everyone who has been part of this journey: family, mentors, colleagues and friends. I am profoundly grateful for your guidance, support and the fun we shared along the way, and I look forward to sharing what’s next.”
Of Palmer, he said the company’s legal future is “in outstanding hands”.
In other recent US tech moves, in May software giant Adobe hired Louise Pentland as CLO from streaming platform Roku.
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