Spotify general counsel Petra Hansson has seen the music streaming company go from start-up to household name. She talks to Alex Aldridge about a memorable three years

Spotify, the online music streaming service, could be on the cusp of something big. The venture capital-backed company, valued at about $250m (£171m) in a fundraising last August, now boasts more than 7 million users, has just entered into profile-raising tie-ups with social networking sites Facebook and Twitter and is in talks about a US launch.

For its general counsel, Petra Hansson, these are exciting times: "It's impossible to know what is going to happen in the future, but we got this far and have had a lot of fun in the process. One of the great things counting in our favour is that we have a lot of people who really love their job and are good at what they do."

Hansson has been with Spotify since 2007 after she was headhunted from leading Swedish law firm Mannheimer Swartling. At the time the company was operating out of a two-bedroom flat in central Stockholm, led by founder Daniel Ek, then just 24. And Hansson, 40, admits to initially not being terribly interested in leaving prestigious Mannheimer to join a start-up without a proper office headed by a guy several years her junior.

But she quickly realised that this wasn't just any start-up, and that Ek wasn't just any 24-year old. "I was very impressed by the technology and the concept," she recalls. "And while I admit the question 'Can I really work for a 24-year-old CEO?' crossed my mind, on meeting Daniel I realised he was 24 going on 40, with a CV to match." (Before founding Spotify, Ek was chief information officer at Stardoll, a fashion and games website.) There was a fair degree of risk, Hansson reasoned, but whatever happened it would be a good learning experience. "And I had a feeling about it; I knew it would be fun," she adds.

Three years on and Spotify has changed beyond recognition; now employing around 160 people out of offices in Stockholm and London, with a five-strong legal team (three in Stockholm, one in London, with Hansson floating in between). It is a relatively large number of in-house lawyers for what is still a fairly small company. Hansson says this is a reflection of the large legal element to what Spotify does: "At the heart of the service we offer lie some complex licensing issues with record labels, music publishers and collecting societies, the latter varying from country to country. It's crucial to make sure these licence agreements strike a suitable balance so that they don't prevent us from developing a new market."

The fact that there aren't many specialist new media private practice lawyers out there is another reason Spotify has stocked up on in-house lawyers. "We took a decision at an early stage to handle our work internally. Nobody understands our business better than us and it makes sense to do this work ourselves," explains Hansson. With Spotify not having been involved in any litigation to date, its only dealings with external law firms are over general corporate work. For this a couple of regular firms are used in each of the seven jurisdictions – Sweden, the UK, Spain, Norway, Finland, France and the Netherlands – in which Spotify operates. In the UK the main adviser is Taylor Wessing.

Other than steering clear of lawsuits ("I loved to litigate in private practice, but it goes without saying that I want to avoid it as a general counsel," says Hansson), one of the main challenges facing Spotify is maintaining its dynamic, start-up mentality as it grows. In this respect, finding the right people to bring on board is crucial – a quest that is far from straightforward. "In my experience the most important thing by far is that somebody is a good, no-nonsense person who is really interested in what they do. At the same time, having an interest in the industry is also important, which explains why so many of the people I work with are passionate about music and technology," reflects Hansson, a connoisseur of 50s and 60s jazz and soul who spent much of her spare time at university organising music festivals.

Spotify's recently recruited London-based legal counsel James Duffett-Smith, who joined the company to support its expanding UK sales operation last October from MySpace, ticked all these boxes. Still, integrating him into a growing team which is now split between different countries required some careful thought. "It was very important to ensure that James got to know the people in the Stockholm office," recalls Hansson. "So we had him work from Sweden for the first two months of his time with us, before returning to London, where I see him regularly on my frequent trips to our office there." With the company expected to grow further in the months ahead, particularly in the UK, it's likely that the legal team will see some new arrivals, perhaps necessitating a re-jig, with Hansson currently considering relocating from Stockholm to London. "It can be a bit ridiculous travelling every week, making it hard to work in an efficient way," she admits of her current situation.

In the short term, though, Hansson will remain a regular on the 7am Stockholm-Heathrow flight. "I'm busy, but having fun and delighted with how things have worked out here."

My typical day: Petra Hansson, Spotify

Arrive at Spotify's Stockholm office about 9:30am. "This is quite late in Sweden. Most private practice lawyers start at 8," says Hansson.
Browse emails and brief team. "Usually via a little chat by the coffee machine," she adds.
Meetings, meetings, meetings. "In between which I try to get my 'proper' lawyer work done, often putting what was agreed in the meeting into some form of agreement."
Stockholm-Heathrow. "If I'm in London that day, I take the 7am plane to Heathrow. I have meetings around 11 at our offices in Soho or elsewhere in London before either heading back to Stockholm that evening or sometimes staying over for a couple of days – hopefully taking in an exhibition if I do."