Senior Counsel, Commercial

Title: Senior Counsel, Commercial

Location: San Francisco

Department: Legal

Compensation

San Francisco $248K – $330K • Offers Equity

The base pay offered may vary depending on multiple individualized factors, including market location, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience. If the role is non-exempt, overtime pay will be provided consistent with applicable laws. In addition to the salary range listed above, total compensation also includes generous equity, performance-related bonus(es) for eligible employees, and the following benefits.

• Medical, dental, and vision insurance for you and your family, with employer contributions to Health Savings Accounts

• Pre-tax accounts for Health FSA, Dependent Care FSA, and commuter expenses (parking and transit)

• 401(k) retirement plan with employer match

• Paid parental leave (up to 24 weeks for birth parents and 20 weeks for non-birthing parents), plus paid medical and caregiver leave (up to 8 weeks)

• Paid time off: flexible PTO for exempt employees and up to 15 days annually for non-exempt employees

• 13+ paid company holidays, and multiple paid coordinated company office closures throughout the year for focus and recharge, plus paid sick or safe time (1 hour per 30 hours worked, or more, as required by applicable state or local law)

• Mental health and wellness support

• Employer-paid basic life and disability coverage

• Annual learning and development stipend to fuel your professional growth

• Daily meals in our offices, and meal delivery credits as eligible

• Relocation support for eligible employees

• Additional taxable fringe benefits, such as charitable donation matching and wellness stipends, may also be provided.

 

 

This role is at-will and OpenAI reserves the right to modify base pay and other compensation components at any time based on individual performance, team or company results, or market conditions.

About the Team

OpenAI’s Legal team plays a crucial role in advancing our mission by tackling innovative and fundamental legal issues in AI. The team includes professionals from diverse legal fields – technology, AI, infrastructure, privacy, IP, corporate, employment, tax, regulatory, and litigation – who collaborate closely with colleagues across the company.

If you are passionate about being a technology lawyer working on cutting-edge challenges, you’ll thrive here.

 

About the Role

We are seeking an experienced commercial attorney to join our commercial legal team. Based in the US, you will help lead commercial legal support for OpenAI’s rapidly growing business, working with teams such as GTM, Partnerships, Procurement, Finance, Product, Infrastructure, and Engineering.

This is a great opportunity to join OpenAI’s commercial legal team, negotiating high-impact agreements and helping to build scalable frameworks for responsible growth.

This role is based in San Francisco, CA. We use a hybrid work model of 3 days in the office per week.

In this role, you will:

• Serve as the legal partner for OpenAI’s business transactions, partnerships, and operations.

• Provide practical, business-oriented legal advice to teams including Sales, Partnerships, Finance, Procurement, and Operations.

• Identify and address commercial, product, regulatory, privacy, and other legal issues arising from commercial transactions.

• Develop strategies and processes for handling legal issues in creative and scalable ways that support growth.

• Monitor and advise on regulatory and compliance matters affecting AI and technology.

• Collaborate with colleagues across OpenAI’s global legal team to ensure alignment across jurisdictions.

You might thrive in this role if you:

• Have 7+ years of experience across in-house and technology-focused law firm roles.

• Bring a strong background in drafting and negotiating complex commercial contracts.

• Are comfortable operating in an entrepreneurial environment, and are proactive and independent.

• Communicate with clarity and business judgment, tailoring advice to enable responsible growth.

• Build cross-functional relationships and adapt communication styles to diverse audiences.

• Have a strong sense of ownership, intellectual curiosity, and enthusiasm for technology.

• Can demonstrate sound judgment in ambiguous or fast-changing situations.

 

About OpenAI

OpenAI is an AI research and deployment company dedicated to ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. We push the boundaries of the capabilities of AI systems and seek to safely deploy them to the world through our products. AI is an extremely powerful tool that must be created with safety and human needs at its core, and to achieve our mission, we must encompass and value the many different perspectives, voices, and experiences that form the full spectrum of humanity. 

We are an equal opportunity employer, and we do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, veteran status, disability, genetic information, or other applicable legally protected characteristic.