Director, Legal - US Commercial

Posted Yesterday
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Austin, TX, USA
Hybrid
Expert/Leader
Artificial Intelligence • Cloud • Security • Software
Sonar is the trust & verification layer for AI and agentic coding, and the industry standard for automated code review.
The Role
Leads Sonar’s US Commercial Legal team, overseeing complex enterprise sales, channel partnership, and vendor agreements. Manages and develops legal professionals, advises executives on contract risk and strategy, partners cross-functionally to enable revenue, and scales contracting infrastructure using CLM and generative AI tools. The role also supports product legal, privacy, and global expansion initiatives.
Summary Generated by Built In
Who is Sonar?

Sonar is driving the future of agent-centric software development. As the leader in AI code verification and governance, we solve a critical problem: ensuring that software generated by AI-assisted developers or autonomous agents is reliable, secure, and maintainable.

Integrating seamlessly with Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, Gemini, and Devin, we help over 75% of the Fortune 100 build trusted, reliable, compliant software. Customers who use Sonar are 44% less likely to report an outage due to AI-generated code.

We believe code verification is the critical missing link in the Agent-Centric Development Cycle (AC/DC). Industry giants like Nvidia, ServiceNow, Booking.com, Goldman Sachs, AstraZeneca, and Ford Motor Company count on us to provide independent, explainable, consistent review and governance of their AI-generated code via products like:

  • SonarQube: The world’s leading AI code review and verification platform.
  • SonarQube Foundation Agent: Currently topping the leaderboards for agentic software repair.
  • SonarSweep & Sonar Context Augmentation: Providing the enterprise-grade context and constraints agents need to be truly effective.

Our team operates across global hubs in Austin, Bochum, Dubai, Geneva, London, Singapore, Tokyo, and Washington D.C. We move with a mindset we call CODE:

  • Committed to our customers and community.
  • Obsessed with quality.
  • Deliberate in our decisions.
  • Effective as one team.

With over $400M in revenue and profitable, fast-paced growth, we are building the backbone of the AI software revolution. If you’re hungry to have an impact, want to build at a fast pace, and ready to work at the forefront of AI, we want to hear from you.


The Impact You Can Have

We are looking for an exceptional, dynamic, and vision-driven legal leader to manage and scale our US Commercial Legal team. As Director of Legal, you will serve as a strategic partner to our business, balancing risk mitigation with high-growth revenue enablement. Reporting directly to the Deputy General Counsel (DGC), you will lead, mentor, and empower a team of commercial legal professionals responsible for driving all US commercial contracting initiatives, including enterprise sales, channel partnerships, and vendor procurement.

We are seeking a proactive, solution-oriented leader who thrives in a fast-paced environment, excels at cross-functional leadership, and is passionate about building scalable, technology-driven legal operations.

How You Will Make an Impact

  • Lead & Mentor the Team: Manage, mentor, and grow the US commercial legal team. Establish team goals, manage workload allocation, and foster a high-performance, collaborative culture focused on career development and operational excellence.
  • Drive Strategic Commercial Matters: Oversee and independently negotiate high-value, highly complex commercial transactions across enterprise sales, channel partnerships, and strategic vendor agreements.
  • Partner Cross-Functionally: Drive alignment across key Sonar leaders and key business functions - including Sales leadership, Procurement, Finance, IT/Security and Product, to unlock revenue and build business-enabling processes.
  • Pioneer Operations & Scale: Lead the strategic development and scaling of our contracting infrastructure. Optimize legal tech tools (including CLM systems and generative AI drafting tools) to streamline workflows, shorten deal cycles, and remove operational blockers.
  • Risk Management & Executive Advisory: Serve as a trusted legal advisor to executive stakeholders on key contract terms, risk profiles, regulatory shifts, and negotiation strategies.
  • Support Company Growth Initiatives: Address emergent legal issues in a high-growth environment, partnering with specialized legal functions on product legal counsel, data privacy, and global expansion strategies.

The Qualities You Will Bring

  • Proven Legal Leadership: J.D. and active Bar admission with 10+ years of commercial and technology legal experience (including SaaS and software negotiations). Prior experience directly managing and leading team members is required.
  • In-House Expertise: Significant in-house experience at a high-growth international technology or software company.
  • Strategic Influence & Executive Presence: Exceptional communication skills with a track record of building trusted relationships with senior leadership, cross-functional teams, and enterprise customers.
  • Domain Mastery: Deep domain knowledge of complex SaaS, software licensing, intellectual property, data protection/privacy, and enterprise revenue recognition principles.
  • Agility & Ownership: Ability to navigate ambiguity, prioritize high-impact initiatives, and manage competing demands in a dynamic environment while maintaining strategic clarity.

In-office culture

We're intentional about this. We believe the best teams are built in the room together. Three anchor days — Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays — create the collaboration rhythm that makes a hub office worth having. 

Candidates need to be genuinely based in the location the role is posted  — if that's not where you are today, we're happy to support relocation for the right person.


We value diversity, equity, and inclusion

At Sonar, we believe that our diversity is our strength. We are a global company that values and respects different backgrounds, perspectives, and cultures. We are committed to fostering a diverse and inclusive work environment where everyone feels valued and empowered to contribute their best. We are proud to be an equal opportunity employer and welcome all qualified applicants, regardless of race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, or veteran status.

If you need any accommodation, please reach out to us at [email protected]. 

All offers of employment at Sonar are contingent upon the results of a comprehensive background check and reference verification conducted before the start date. 

Applications that are submitted through agencies or third party recruiters will not be considered. 

Skills Required

  • J.D. degree
  • Active Bar admission
  • 10+ years of commercial and technology legal experience
  • Experience negotiating SaaS and software agreements
  • Direct team management and leadership experience
  • Significant in-house experience at a high-growth international technology or software company
  • Deep knowledge of complex SaaS, software licensing, intellectual property, data protection and privacy, and enterprise revenue recognition principles
  • Exceptional communication and executive relationship-building skills
  • Ability to manage ambiguity, prioritize high-impact initiatives, and handle competing demands

What the Team is Saying

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The Company
HQ: Austin, TX
800 Employees
Year Founded: 2008

What We Do

Sonar provides the essential verification layer for the AI-driven development era, ensuring all code—whether human-written or AI-generated—is code you can trust. Today, AI coding tools are generating explosive volumes of code. This has created an "engineering productivity paradox" : faster code writing doesn't automatically lead to faster, safer software delivery. The new bottleneck is verification. Sonar solves this. Integrating code quality and code security into a single platform (SonarQube), Sonar is the foundation for high performance software engineering, analyzing over 750 billion lines of code daily to ensure applications are secure, reliable, and maintainable. As an independent verification platform, Sonar enables organizations to securely develop at the speed of AI. We are driven by a deep belief in our people, a commitment to excellence, and an unwavering dedication to delivery. We operate as a united group where our collective success is the sum of each individual's contributions. Our company culture is driven by the values of CODE: Committed, Obsessed, Deliberate & Effective. This mindset reflects our culture of creativity, collaboration, and pride in the work we do. Rooted in the open source community, Sonar’s solutions support over 35 programming languages, frameworks, and infrastructure technologies. Today, Sonar is used by 7M+ developers worldwide, including ServiceNow, Booking.com, Deutsche Bank, AstraZeneca, and Ford Motor Company. Sonar is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland with additional offices in Austin, Texas; Bochum, Germany; London, Singapore, and Tokyo. The company is rapidly growing with over 800 employees! Join us in our mission to solve the trillion-dollar challenge of bad code!

Why Work With Us

We are a product-first company, with a people-first culture. Every employee has the opportunity to grow and learn. We promote from within, provide regular feedback and professional development opportunities, value the right to fail along with respect and kindness and work with team members to achieve their full potential.

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Sonar Offices

Hybrid Workspace

Employees engage in a combination of remote and on-site work.

At Sonar, we require employees to come into the office 3 days/week.

Typical time on-site: 3 days a week
HQAustin, TX office
Geneva Office (HQ)
Annecy Office
Bochum Office
London Office
Singapore Office
Learn more

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