Former AOL lawyer and executive Michael McGowan has been tapped to serve as the first general counsel of Verus International Inc., a global consumer food products supplier that scored a marketing agreement with Major League Baseball earlier this year. 

McGowan arrives at the Gaithersburg, Maryland-based firm with more than two decades of experience in corporate legal departments and boardrooms. He most recently served as the GC of Cava Group Inc. and oversaw the restaurant company's $300 million acquisition of the Zoes Kitchen restaurant chain in 2018.

"Throughout my career, I have had the opportunity to be a senior leader for several amazing growth stories. That is one of the reasons I joined Verus at this key point in its business acceleration," McGowan said Sept. 26 in a statement that announced his hiring.

He added, "Many of the largest companies in the world came from humble beginnings, so the opportunity to help shape Verus during a period of hyper growth is very appealing. I am excited to join the Verus team."

Earlier in his career, McGowan worked at AOL as an associate general counsel, vice president of corporate development and legal and, later as VP of strategy and business development, according to his LinkedIn profile. 

McGowan was involved in the now-notorious AOL-Time Warner merger and several other major M&A deals, including a $1.2 billion purchase of Netscape and a $1 billion acquisition of MapQuest. 

McGowan also had a hand in AOL's investments with Gateway Inc., TiVo Corp. and Kinko's, which merged with FedEx Corp. Attempts to speak with him were not immediately successful. 

Verus, which trades on the over-the-counter market, set an all-time revenue record of $3.48 million for the third quarter, reporting a revenue increase of 154% over the same quarter last year. In April, the company announced that it had acquired Big League Foods Inc. and its license to sell MLB-branded ice cream and candy for all 30 baseball teams in the league. 

Verus CEO Anshu Bhatnagar noted in a prepared statement that the firm's leaders have "known for a while that we needed in-house counsel, partly due to the growing size and complexity of our M&A and international dealings, but also with an eye toward the increasing number of product lines that we intend to add. 

"We expect that this new position will speed up our transactions and save Verus considerable legal costs in future quarters. To say that we are excited to have Michael join us would be an understatement," he said.