Helena Haapio, International Business Contract Expert, Appointed Professor of Practice at the University of Vaasa

Haapio earned her doctoral degree from the University of Vaasa in 2013. Her dissertation focused on proactive contracting and improving contract usability.

– I am already familiar with the University of Vaasa. I started as a part-time lecturer in the Master's Programme in Strategic Business Law in 2012. You could say I have, in a way, come full circle and am returning to the same themes.

Haapio is a long-standing industrial lawyer specialising in international business contracts. She is an entrepreneur and contract strategist at Lexpert Ltd, the company she founded. Her work has taken her around the world to conduct workshops on contract risk management, not only in Europe and the Americas, but also in India and the United Arab Emirates. She also has experience in dispute resolution, serving as an arbitrator in the settlement of commercial disputes. Before becoming an entrepreneur, she worked as an in-house counsel in Wärtsilä's central administration and in various units both in Finland and abroad.

The Professorship of Practice in Strategic Business Law supports the goals of the Accounting and Finance Academic Unit, as well as the Business Law Department and Research Group, to develop a doctoral pathway in Legal Design. This pathway seeks new ways to combine business law and design expertise to support business success and is central to the University's strategic aim of expanding doctoral education.

– My aim is to further advance multidisciplinary research that integrates different disciplines and professional fields in a concrete way. I intend to contribute to the development of postgraduate studies at the University of Vaasa by combining perspectives from strategic business law, business, design and technology. I bring extensive domestic and international networks, experience and proven results from research and development collaboration with companies and universities, as well as new tools for fostering innovation in business law.

Haapio's responsibilities include developing the doctoral pathway, strengthening business collaboration, and advancing the University’s internationalisation efforts. She is also working with the University's CoDoc model, which provides companies with access to cutting-edge research, early insights into results, and opportunities to combine their own RDI activities with independent scientific research. CoDoc is based on co-funding, with both the partner and the University of Vaasa jointly funding the doctoral research. In addition, Haapio supervises the dissertation work of doctoral students in business law.

– I want to help researchers and companies harness contracts and legal tools to better support business. This calls for courage and the ability to cross disciplinary boundaries and to innovate in both thinking and practice. The University of Vaasa and its surroundings have what it takes to make that happen.