Herbert Smith Freehills has appointed Peter Jones as a partner in its Technology, Media and Telecommunications (TMT) practice in Sydney. Peter, who joins the firm from DLA Piper, will commence his new role in early June 2019.
Peter is currently the head of DLA Piper’s Tech Sector in Australia, is the Sydney Location Head of its Intellectual Property and Technology Group, and has regional responsibility for data protection, cyber resilience and information risks.
He has extensive experience advising clients on a broad range of matters involving complex technology contracting and outsourcing arrangements, often with a significant regulatory influence, and including privacy related issues.
Peter also works closely with corporate partners on a wide range of complex M&A transactions and on M&A transactions in the technology sector. Peter’s work in this area has included negotiating long term services and transitional services arrangements which are an important part of many corporate acquisition and divestment projects.
Herbert Smith Freehills Head of Corporate, Carolyn Pugsley said: “We are very pleased to welcome Peter to Herbert Smith Freehills. He is a highly regarded senior technology lawyer and his appointment will bolster our already large and strong client offering in the TMT space.
“The scope of work and types of clients that our practice supports now extends well beyond technology in the traditional sense due to the emergence of information as an asset class, the implications of shared technology platforms, and competitive market pressure brought about by disruption and pending regulatory reforms. Increasingly the TMT practice leads corporate and commercial transactions where there is a technology or innovation element, or other technology enabled disruption involved.
“Peter’s considerable expertise as a technology lawyer across a range of sectors, including financial services, telecommunications, energy and government will be an invaluable addition to our practice.”
Prior to joining DLA Piper in 2014, Peter spent 15 years at Gilbert and Tobin, including eight years as a partner.
Herbert Smith Freehills has a large, dedicated global TMT practice, with several partners and over 50 lawyers based in Australia. It undertakes complex and often regional or global technology transformation programmes, large scale outsourcings, telecommunications and network transactions, infrastructure roll-outs, software transactions, cloud projects and IP commercialisation work for a wide range of corporates across all sectors.
Some recent transactions led by Herbert Smith Freehills’ Australian TMT team include advising:
- nbn on a wide range of matters including technology sourcing, technology transactions, software arrangements, IT security standards and regulatory advice.
- Simply Energy in relation to its innovative new “virtual power plant” project and its involvement in leading-edge ‘distributed energy exchange’ project.
- Orica in its investment in, and global IP partnership and go-to-market arrangements with, US tech start-up DataCloud, Inc.
- NSW Government in relation to whole of government negotiations in relation to Salesforce.