DATA Unlocked

Data is the raw ingredient for digital transformation, with the potential to unlock efficiency gains, power innovative business models, offer personalised, customer-centric services and create new revenue streams for commercial advantage.

But while it’s a good start to recognise the potential value in the data that your business holds, realising that potential needs creativity, insight and even a little boldness.

We can help you with this. We will not only bring our deep understanding of the legal issues, but also our vast experience of working on data projects across multiple sectors. We can share our knowledge of market practice as well as best practice; our insights into regulators' priorities; and our understanding of how future developments could impact your strategy. Our objective is to set you up to find the insights you need to maximise the value of data in a legally compliant but commercial way.

As well as bespoke advice on a particular project, we can help you with the strategic thinking about your overall data strategy, including through the options below of a workshop or presentation. Our data team has been ranked as the number one European-headquartered legal practice for data and related services in the GDR 100, the only global ranking that captures the capabilities, track record, and market reputation of the leading firms advising on data.

Data Workshop

Your business holds a wealth of data about many aspects of your operations, your customers, your supply chain, and your wider commercial interactions.

Some of that data is fundamental strategic intelligence, not to be shared with competitors. Or it may be data which doesn’t appear particularly useful in isolation but might become powerful if combined with wider market data or other data from within your business, or if used in conjunction with artificial intelligence or other advanced analytics systems. Some is personal information to be handled with appropriate care. Other data might have sector regulatory requirements around it. Some data is covered by intellectual property rights, while other data has less protection but carries clear commercial value and so needs contractual protection.

Following an initial preparatory conversation around the data your business holds and how it is used, our data experts will provide a bespoke 2-3 hour workshop for your senior team (typically including representatives from your legal, IT and commercial teams). We'd shape the workshop to suit your objectives, but a typical session might cover:

• a directed brainstorm around the categories of data your business holds or has access to, highlighting legal, regulatory and commercial considerations around exploiting those data categories, including intellectual property rights, data privacy/GDPR, artificial intelligence, any sector-specific regulation, and competition law
• options for structuring how your business holds and uses data, in particular issues around ownership and licensing of data both within a group structure and with third party data owners. This might include data trusts and other innovative models for data exploitation
• strategic data collection issues, including ways of improving your rights in your data, the risks of holding data, and the use of cookies and other tracking technologies
• data governance: what it means in practice, why it matters, and different models.

We will capture the workshop discussions, highlighting key issues and including suggested next steps and priorities.

Readiness Report

Whether your business is about to embark on a data commercialisation project, or a project is already underway, it's important to consider whether your organisation is taking the right steps from a legal and regulatory perspective to ensure successful and compliant delivery.

We can help by bringing our in-depth data expertise and specialism to bear on your data commercialisation plans. Our expert team can undertake a detailed, legal and regulatory review of your proposals, and prepare a bespoke Readiness Report covering the legal and regulatory opportunities and risks. If desired, we can also present our key findings and insights to your data project team and/or Board, and then discuss how best to mitigate the risks and maximise the opportunities. The report will be tailored to your needs, but would typically:

• identify and explain key potential legal and regulatory risks and liabilities associated with the project, including potential personal liability for directors
• propose options or alternative approaches for addressing/mitigating risks, including in relation to any ongoing compliance programmes
• suggest a provisional prioritisation of issues

Board presentation

We would be delighted to present direct to your board, either as the lead or alongside your legal or commercial teams.

This will help support your Board in understanding the legal frameworks and constraints around the data which you hold or have access to. This could form a standalone session, or we can present the outcomes from our workshop or readiness reports. The presentation would be supported by a Board paper submitted in advance to deepen discussions. We can help to support their strategic thinking about data to generate new revenues and drive digital transformation.