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Our approach

We are award winning commercial lawyers, based in Kent, with experience of acting for businesses of all sizes nationally, ranging from start-ups to FTSE 100 and multi-national conglomerates – with particular expertise in the mid-market space.

Our team of commercial lawyers draw on legal, commercial and industry expertise, to fulfil the role of trusted ‘in-house counsel’ or to act as an extension to an in-house legal team. We combine deep and broad legal experience with extensive business insight, allowing us to understand your business objectives and meet your commercial needs.

We offer expert commercial legal advice on a wide range of commercial issues, including:

  • Commercial contracts
  • Outsourcing solutions
  • Supply chain arrangements
  • Procurement arrangements
  • Distribution, agency and franchise
  • Technology contracts, licensing and implementation
  • Sponsorship, marketing and advertising
  • Data protection and information law
  • Intellectual property
  • Projects and infrastructure
  • Contract management.

At every stage, our focus remains on providing intelligent commercial advice and practical solutions to your issues.

We understand that each client requires a bespoke approach, in line with their unique aims and goals. We develop an in-depth understanding of your businesses objectives and commercial needs and then harness our sector expertise to help you achieve your goals.

 

The corporate & commercial team at Thomson Snell & Passmore is very commercial in its approach, taking time to understand their clients’ objectives and dedicated to achieving the best results for its clients.

Commercial contracts

Our team of commercial contract lawyers, based in Kent, has extensive experience advising clients nationally on high value, complex and strategically important business relationships with their customers, suppliers and business partners.

When negotiating a business relationship on our clients’ behalf, we ensure that risks are appropriately managed so that the agreed legal terms adequately protect the business, whilst allowing for a healthy and commercially beneficial relationship to grow.

We regularly advise on:

  • Agency and distribution agreements
  • Supply agreements of goods and services
  • Purchase agreements of goods and services
  • Manufacturing agreements
  • Franchising agreements
  • Outsourcing agreements
  • R&D agreements
  • Ecommerce, Technology and IT agreements
  • Collaboration and joint ventures
  • Sponsorship, marketing and advertising agreements
  • Warehousing, transport and logistics agreements
  • Confidentiality and exclusivity agreements
  • Deeds of variation, novation or termination.

Thomson Snell & Passmore consistently provide expert legal advice in many different areas and over many years have given us confidence in our business affairs knowing that they are there to rely on. Colleagues are very good at presenting options and directing which of those they think are best, and at times, asking us to reflect on courses of action we may be considering, yet at the same time respecting our businesses way of working. I think they understand our principles and ethics very well. This year they helped us navigate a delicate business unit sale including a TUPE. They also completed a complex restructure of our organisations different companies.

Data & privacy issues

We understand that information and data is now, for many clients, critical to the organisation’s success and that all clients are impacted by how they handle personal data.

The information and data an organisation collects, holds, controls and/ or processes must be adequately (and safely!) collected and used to ensure it can be commercialised and used effectively (including looking after your staff appropriately).

Our commercial lawyers, based in Kent, can advise you on:

  • GDPR/ data protection compliance, audits, policies, procedures and contractual mechanisms
  • Privacy policies (both internal and external)
  • Information and data sharing arrangements (both domestic and international)
  • Data subject access requests
  • Data breaches
  • Employment related issues (such as use of CCTV and covid-19 policies)
  • PECR and E-marketing
  • Cookies and relevant policies
  • Social media issues.

A highly technical team with relevant experience and practical insight.

Intellectual property

We understand how valuable intellectual property (IP) can be as an asset and that it needs to be carefully protected, used and commercialised depending on the circumstances.

Our experience and expertise includes non-contentious IP assignments, licenses, IP audits, advice in relation to large corporate transactions and IP protection/ disputes.

We regularly advise on:

  • Brand protection
  • Licensing
  • Assignment
  • Joint research and development
  • Designs patents
  • Trade secrets and know-how
  • Non-disclosure and confidentiality
  • Infringement
  • Reputation management
  • Social media
  • Joint ventures within research and development.

Technology, IT & outsourcing

We are a trusted advisor to a wide-spectrum of clients ranging from start-ups to national and international organisations.

Our team regularly advises on a wide range of technology and IT issues, including:

  • Outsourcing agreements for IT support, managed services and transaction processing
  • Outsourcing of innovative technologies in the workplace (such as Facebook Workplace)
  • Software development, licensing and maintenance agreements
  • Website development and hosting agreements
  • Framing and linking agreements
  • Acceptable use policies
  • Cloud
  • Online terms of business and privacy policies
  • Data protection and intellectual property rights in the context of website content
  • Protecting website content and taking action against copycats and other intellectual property infringers
  • Domain names including ownership issues such as cybersquatting and gripe sites
  • Ecommerce
  • Security issues.

Our understanding of technology and IT allows us to offer pragmatic advice to ensure arrangements put in place allow for full commercial benefit to be delivered, whilst managing risk and any compliance issues.

I have worked with Jonathan on a number of complex procurement issues. He combines an impressive technical grasp of this difficult and often a grey area of the law with a valuable ability to give pragmatic and sensible advice.

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