Sean D. Major

Sean D. Major is executive vice president, general counsel & secretary at Air Products. He has responsibility for leading the company’s legal organization worldwide. He also assumed responsibility for the company’s global Environment, Health, Safety & Quality organization in late 2020. 

Mr. Major has extensive experience in counseling and advising boards of directors, c-suite officers and executive leadership teams of public companies, particularly on matters related to corporate governance, strategic relationships, acquisitions and divestitures, restructurings, joint ventures, project finance and capital markets transactions. Having lived and worked as an in-house attorney in both Asia and Europe, Mr. Major has successfully negotiated, documented and closed a wide range of complex cross-border transactions involving over 50 jurisdictions. 

Prior to joining Air Products in 2017, Mr. Major served since 2007 as executive vice president, general counsel and secretary at Joy Global, a leading manufacturer and servicer of high-productivity mining equipment. Mr. Major also served as director from 2011-2016, and as chairman since 2012, of FutureGen Industrial Alliance, a consortium of energy producers that worked with the U.S. Department of Energy to design and permit a commercial-scale, deep saline CO₂ storage site, and advanced critical aspects of oxy-combustion and carbon capture and storage technologies. Earlier in his career, Mr. Major was employed by Johnson Controls and Abbott Laboratories, serving in roles of increasing legal responsibility. Before moving in-house, Mr. Major spent seven years in private practice at law firms in Chicago and Tokyo. 

Mr. Major holds a B.A. degree in economics from DePauw University, a J.D. from the Indiana University School of Law, and an M.B.A. from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. 

6/2021