General Counsel & Compliance Officer
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Location: Porto / Romariz, Portugal
Reports To: Chairman & CEO, with direct board-level reporting on licensing progress
Job Type: Full-time
ABOUT THE ROLE
Carpathia Portugal is incorporating a new, licensed precision-manufacturing and, upon licensing, regulated defense-manufacturing platform in Porto/Romariz; with an explicit mandate to pursue all Portuguese and EU defense licensing immediately, and calls licensing "the critical path," resourced as such from incorporation.
Carpathia is expanding the role's scope beyond licensing alone into a full General Counsel & Compliance Officer function: the single internal owner of everything the company needs to stay legally and administratively compliant — contracts, HR and immigration, corporate registrations, licensing, certifications, funding-program applications, intellectual property, and coordination on tax and banking matters — so that manufacturing and innovation leadership can focus on building and inventing rather than compliance administration. You will work directly with the Chairman & CEO, report to the board on licensing milestones, and coordinate (rather than duplicate) the company's existing external counsel and advisor relationships as the business scales.
WHAT YOU'LL DO
• Own Portugal/EU defense and industrial licensing as the critical path from Day 1: incorporation and CAE registration, the facility licensing dossier (targeted within 90 days of close), Portuguese arms manufacturing and trade authorizations, and all import/export licenses — including the continuous per-order EU/NATO export licensing regime — with direct board-level reporting on progress.
• Own the company's ISO and product/quality certification track (ISO 9001 and other program- or customer-specific certifications as they become qualification prerequisites), coordinating the compliance-documentation side of the work with the Director of Engineering's quality system.
• Own and file the company's applications to Portuguese, EU, and NATO funding and grant programs (EIC Accelerator, European Defence Fund, EDIP, NATO DIANA, IAPMEI, PT2030, PRR), managing the legal and compliance documentation for each application and its ongoing reporting obligations.
• Own all other compliance certifications, codes, and registrations the company needs to legally manufacture, sell, and export — CAE activity codes, REACH compliance for coatings and materials, and any further sector-specific codes required by regulators or customers.
• Draft, review, and negotiate the company's commercial contracts on an ongoing basis — not only at signing — across all vendor and client relationships: OEM supply and framework agreements with pipeline counterparties, the US and global distribution partnerships, supplier and subcontract-machining agreements, and the Romariz facility lease, flagging risk and renewal terms proactively.
• Draft and maintain Portuguese-law-compliant employment contracts and HR policies for all new hires, and own the security-vetting and background-check processes required for roles with access to export-controlled technical data.
• Manage immigration and work-authorization matters, Portuguese work-visa sponsorship and residency processes for any non-EU hires.
• Own corporate registrations and structure across the group's Portuguese footprint: CAE industrial activity codes, and completion of EU trademark protection for the Carpathia brand.
• Own the company's intellectual property portfolio: protection of barrel-production and process know-how (patents and trade secrets as appropriate) and trademark/brand-protection registrations for the Carpathia name and mark, both domestically and internationally (Portugal/EUIPO and, where warranted, the Madrid Protocol).
• Review the company's tax matters and banking relationships — corporate tax compliance across the group's Portuguese, US, and Madeira entities, and equipment-financing, leasing, and banking documentation — working alongside external accountants and the Finance function as it is built out.
• Coordinate and manage the company's existing external counsel and advisor relationships (corporate/incorporation counsel, capital-raise counsel, defense-specialist counsel, accountants, and tax advisors) as the in-house owner who instructs, briefs, and quality-controls outside advisors rather than duplicating their work.
• Support the legal workstream of the capital raise: milestone-tranche documentation, investor information rights and board-seat mechanics, and diligence-room document management and accuracy.
• Advise the Chairman & CEO and department heads on Portuguese, EU, and relevant international corporate-law issues arising from the group's multi-entity structure, keeping the Portugal platform's standalone structure clean and properly documented.
• Track and manage relationships with the Portuguese and EU bodies relevant to the plan (industrial licensing authorities, national IP registry, and applicable co-funding programs), representing the company in licensing and regulatory meetings.
• Maintain the compliance calendar and documentation trail behind every regulatory and contractual claim made to investors and customers, consistent with the company's claim-discipline and milestone-governance standards.
REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS
• Qualified lawyer (admitted to the Portuguese Bar or an equivalent EU jurisdiction) with 8+ years of post-qualification experience spanning corporate/commercial law, employment law, and regulatory/compliance work.
• Direct, hands-on experience with Portuguese corporate law and company administration (Lda and SA structures, CAE registration, corporate governance) and Portuguese employment law.
• Experience with, or demonstrated ability to quickly master, Portuguese and EU defense/dual-use regulatory frameworks: national arms manufacturing and trade licensing, import/export licensing, the EU Dual-Use Regulation (EU) 2021/821, and EU/NATO export-control regimes.
• Experience drafting and negotiating commercial contracts — supply agreements, distribution agreements, leases, and agent/introducer agreements — in an international, multi-counterparty context.
• Working knowledge of Portuguese immigration and work-authorization processes for both executive relocation and employee sponsorship.
• Comfort reviewing corporate tax matters and banking/financing documentation (equipment leasing, working-capital facilities) alongside external accountants, even where not personally a tax specialist.
• Comfort operating across multiple jurisdictions and legal systems (Portugal/EU, with working awareness of US and other group entities' corporate structures) without needing every matter escalated to outside counsel.
• Professional working proficiency in Portuguese and English; French and Spanish a plus given the group's footprint.
• Sound judgment and discretion appropriate to defense-sector and investor-facing confidential information.
PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS
• Prior in-house counsel or compliance-officer experience at a regulated manufacturer, defense company, or dual-use technology company.
• Experience preparing or managing applications to EU non-dilutive funding instruments (EIC Accelerator, European Defence Fund, EDIP, NATO DIANA, or national programs such as IAPMEI/PT2030) from a legal or compliance-documentation perspective.
• Experience supporting a venture or private capital raise (term sheets, milestone-tranche mechanics, investor information rights) alongside, rather than instead of, dedicated securities counsel.
• Experience managing an intellectual property portfolio — patents, trade secrets, and trademark registration and international brand protection (Portuguese/EUIPO filings and the Madrid Protocol).
• Familiarity with product/quality certification processes (ISO 9001, AQAP, or comparable defense-quality standards) from a compliance-documentation standpoint.
• Experience managing outside counsel and advisor relationships across multiple practice areas and jurisdictions, including accountants and tax advisors.
WHAT WE OFFER
• The company's Day 1 legal and compliance seat, with direct board-level reporting and ownership of the single item the business plan names as its critical path: Portuguese and EU defense licensing.
• Broad scope and genuine influence over how the company is built — its corporate structure, its first commercial contracts, and its licensing strategy — from incorporation onward.
• Competitive compensation, commensurate with experience.
To apply: office@carpathia-engineering.com
Carpathia is an equal opportunity employer operating under Portuguese and EU law. All offers of employment are contingent upon verification of eligibility to work in Portugal/the EU and, where applicable, completion of any required background or security vetting.
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