Paula heads up our large UK commercial team which includes five sub-teams: competition, commercial contracts, data and privacy, intellectual property and technology.
Paula specialises in commercial contract law and outsourcing and has extensive experience of advising on and negotiating complex contractual arrangements for clients in various sectors, including financial institutions and retail. She has in-depth expertise in all aspects of outsourcing (including business process outsourcing), as well as concession, sponsorship, advertising, distribution, agency and franchising arrangements.
Paula prides herself on building strong relationships with clients and developing a deep understanding of their strategy, business and key issues so that she can truly act as an extension of the in house team. Paula also has strong project management skills with extensive experience of leading and project managing large cross office, multidisciplinary teams in the delivery of major projects.
Experience
Examples of experience include advising:
- A national infrastructure client on the first generation outsourcing of its entire HR function. This was an extremely complex project and involved the review and amendment of numerous detailed operational schedules
- A US cosmetics company listed on the NYSE on contractual arrangements relating to its entry into the UK market, including distribution, warehousing and logistics
- Old Mutual Wealth on the outsourcing of its entire facilities management function across all of its UK office locations
- A FTSE 100 defence client on an airside transport engineering services arrangement with Heathrow Airport for the maintenance of the airside vehicle fleet. This included advising on the content of the ITTs and providing all legal support in drafting the services agreement and negotiation of the agreements to signature
- TSB on its high profile, long term exclusive sponsorship of the Pride of Britain and Pride of Sport Awards, a key part of TSB's new brand strategy following its separation from Lloyds. Negotiating the terms of the Sponsorship Agreement on behalf of TSB with Mirror Group, which owns the commercial rights in Pride of Britain and Pride of Sport
- B&Q and other high street retailers on business critical outsourcing arrangements including security, catering, distribution centres, HR, head office and call centre services.
Clients describe Paula's advice as "always commercial and relevant" and compliment Paula on her "professionalism, reliability, courtesy and project management skills" and describe her "unflappable manner" as a "great asset".