Commercial and Product Counsel (Contractor)

About the role

At Arceus, we believe the way companies receive legal support is overdue for reinvention. Legal teams are expected to move faster than ever across commercial, product, privacy, procurement, and operational work, but the tools and delivery models available to them haven't kept pace. We're building the legal infrastructure layer for modern companies — combining experienced attorneys with intelligent technology to deliver high-quality legal services at the speed growing businesses demand. Our attorneys don't just practice law; they shape the systems, playbooks, and technology that make every engagement better than the last, turning legal expertise into scalable workflows that redefine how legal work gets done. This is a remote role based anywhere in the U.S.

The opportunity

We are seeing incredible demand for our product. The market is open for us to capture and emerge as the winners in this new category. This is a rare chance to help define how technology transforms the delivery of legal services over the next decade.

Ideal candidate

You're an attorney who thrives as a trusted partner to fast-moving companies. You've spent years advising on commercial transactions, ideally with real exposure to product, privacy, and the day-to-day legal grind. You move fast, give practical advice, and catch the details everyone else misses. You lead with empathy and responsiveness, take time to understand what the customer is trying to accomplish, and optimize for practical outcomes — not abstract legal perfection. We're especially excited to meet attorneys who've been the sole counsel or first legal hire somewhere. You're comfortable wearing multiple hats and balancing competing priorities across the legal function.

What success looks like

• Day 7: You're onboarded onto our tooling and workflows, and reviewing client legal matters independently at our quality bar
• Day 14: You've documented review playbooks for your recurring contract types, privacy, and product inquiries, and are consistently hitting quality and turnaround standards
• Day 30: You've helped codify how Arceus reviews commercial contracts, advises on product matters, and contributed to a product moat your playbooks made possible, and set a standard the rest of the team ramps against

Responsibilities

• Build trusted customer relationships by communicating proactively, understanding each customer’s business priorities, and treating their outcomes as your own
• Review and negotiate commercial contracts; advise on product and privacy matters across the day-to-day needs of growing tech companies
• Partner closely with legal and product teams to move contracts through efficiently and accurately
• Interpret contract terms and surface key obligations, risks, and anomalies
• Operate our internal tooling to streamline review — and partner with product and engineering to make the platform faster and more accurate over time
• Spot inefficiencies and patterns in the review process, then fix them
• Standardize and codify recurring contract types, review playbooks, and quality bars
• Protect turnaround and SLA commitments
• Partner with operations to evolve how we deliver legal services as we scale

Requirements

• J.D. and active bar membership in good standing
• 5-8 years of experience practicing law, with significant experience supporting technology companies; experience as in-house counsel or as a sole legal counsel is required
• Specialize in commercial, product, and privacy law
• A deeply customer-first mindset: responsive, empathetic, low-ego, and committed to delivering practical advice that helps the business move forward
• A relentless process mindset: always faster, better, more consistent
• Experience with, or real excitement about, AI-assisted legal workflows
• Comfortable in a fast-paced, ambiguous, high-ownership environment
• Strong grounding in professional responsibility and legal ethics
• Excellent written and verbal communication

Pay

Hourly rate of $100–$150, based on experience

Schedule

Up to 20 hours per week, depending on business and client needs

Part-time independent contractor engagement

Opportunity to convert to full-time