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CMS is pleased to announce the new heads for five of its international expertise groups. All CMS lawyers work in cross-border groups in 76 cities across 45 countries that are structured according to the industries in which our clients operate. Commercial Sam De Silva (CMS UK) will join Aukje Haan (CMS Netherlands) as co-head of the CMS Commercial Group. Based in London, Sam specialises in complex and strategic technology and outsourcing projects including all forms of cloud computing, outsourcing, system development and supply, system integration, software licensing, and support and service agreements. Sam also regularly advises on data protection, privacy, cybersecurity and Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) issues. Employment Gaël Chuffart (CMS Belgium) and Daniela Krömer (CMS Austria) have been appointed as co-heads of the CMS Employment Group. Based in Brussels, Gaël advises on a wide range of employment law and social security matters. He specialises in collective labour relations, individual labour law and remuneration conditions. He also advises on international employee mobility. Daniela, based in Vienna, specialises in employment law and European law. In her work she focuses on assisting clients with issues such as the cross-border use of labour, as well as equal-treatment issues. Life Sciences & Healthcare Sarah Hanson (CMS UK) and Roland Wiring (CMS Germany) have been named as co-heads of the CMS Life Sciences & Healthcare Group. Sarah is based in London and specialises in high value, cross-border commercial, intellectual property and outsourcing transactions. She has advised on a broad range of commercial agreements related to in-licensing and out-licensing, sales and distributor arrangements, research and development, manufacturing and supply, strategic alliances and joint ventures. Based in Hamburg, Roland advises and represents pharmaceutical, medical device and biotech companies as well as enterprises in related industries. He specialises in drafting contracts for research and development, cooperations, distribution and transaction, and has expert knowledge of issues related to advertising. Private Equity Hamburg-based partner, Jacob Siebert (CMS Germany) joins Jason Zemmel (CMS UK) as co-head of the CMS Private Equity Group. Jacob advises strategic investors and private equity funds on merger and acquisition transactions, joint ventures and private equity investments, often across borders. He has significant experience in advising on buy-outs and public takeovers. Jacob also assists his clients with all aspects of corporate law. Public Procurement Brussels-based partner, Virginie Dor (CMS Belgium) has been named as the head of the CMS Public Procurement Group. In this role, Virginie specialises in legal support for large-scale public projects and advises contracting authorities and companies in all sectors on advisory and litigation matters. Additionally, she supports projects in the fields of life-sciences, construction, IT and energy.

A unique life sciences Forum brought the legal challenges created by the rapid pace of technological advances into sharp focus with sector focused sessions and informative workshops. Experts from across the sector framed the incredible potential from digital and AI and called for the expertise of legal teams to take the ‘’regulatory handbrake’ off innovation that has transformative potential for healthcare systems and patients. CMS’s much-anticipated Global Life Sciences & Healthcare Forum 2023, co-hosted by Ellen Gielen, Roland Wiring and Gertie Lintjens, delivered a wealth of insight and ignited discussion about how regulatory frameworks can be tested and revised without compromising safety, security and compliance. Blurring Boundaries – Exploring the convergence of life sciences and law heard from leading figures from pharmaceutical companies, cutting edge AI enterprises, legal experts and biotech organisations with a strong accent on debate and collaboration. Marc Kaptein, Medical Director, Pfizer, revealed the unchartered territory he and his team had to tread during the pandemic as the company partnered with BioNTech to release a COVID vaccine and maximise its public uptake. In a fascinating talk, he outlined the twists and turns of the inside story of how Pfizer struck a rapid deal with BioNTech by ‘shaking hands’ and then balanced the societal benefits of maximising its vaccination with legal constraints designed to control public promotion.A willingness to break fresh ground legally, politically, scientifically and logistically was an integral part of the success story and he underlined to guests at the Forum, held in Amsterdam, that ‘without blurring boundaries, we would not have got where we are today’. Joep Rijnierse, Senior Medical Director at Amgen, highlighted its pioneering approach to  work closely with patient groups to generate therapy promise across a complete health condition. He said that the company’s medical departments worked with internal and external legal advisers to find ways to manage constraints in the mission to enhance all areas of healthcare delivery to improve systems and outcomes. Legal expertise is critical in shaping the landscape for AI developments and speakers from across the life sciences spectrum underscored the need for regulatory frameworks to evolve at pace. Life sciences is experiencing seismic change and Thibault Helleputte, the Founder and CEO of DNAlytics, revealed that the BioGPT initiative was able to identify medical hypotheses from deep in the data of 15 million papers in PubMed library to give scientists unprecedented R&D leads. The Forum was an opportunity to discuss how legal teams can use their skill and knowledge to ensure that regulatory frameworks did not impede progress and to explore fast and safe pathways for innovations to become working reality. Wouter Boon, Associate Professor in Innovation and Life Sciences at Utrecht University, emphasised the need to place legal aspects at the inception of the innovation process, observing that the sector was ‘highly regulated for all good reasons but it means that radical innovation has a tough job.’The Forum covered an impressive sweep of themes including AI, digital therapeutics, the challenges of multi-jur­is­dic­tion­al online pharmacies, the new EU medicines directive and co-creation with regulators.“We had a great range of speakers who focused on advances and roadblocks across the life sciences sector and provided us all with some innovative and provocative approaches,” said Nick Beckett, Global Co-Head of CMS Life Sciences & Healthcare Sector Group. “It was a fantastic opportunity to discuss, explore and collaborate and the insights and learnings it generated will help us face global challenges in life sciences.“We have to navigate global challenges such as sustainability, poverty, inequality, ageing populations; concerns about privacy with the use of data, concerns about ethics and the use of AI. To do that we need global perspectives and we believe that CMS as a firm, with 80 offices worldwide, is well positioned to navigate issues, foster collaborations and be a vital partner in moving life science innovation forward in the digital age.”

CMS Life Sciences & Healthcare Sector Group’s Forum 2023 provides expert insights, discussion and innovations to meet the challenge

Uncertain times, an evolving legal framework: managing risks and ensuring social responsibility in the life sciences & healthcare sector The risks of AI in the future of life sciences will come under the microscope at a landmark legal forum this week. Healthcare is racing ahead in adopting new technologies across drug discovery, development, manufacturing and supply chain but experts predict a tail-whip of disputes and contract friction. Digital transformation has the potential to improve every aspect of healthcare and the pharma industry but it also impacts data protection, IT security, contract design, liability and regulation. The annual CMS Global Life Sciences and Healthcare Forum will bring together high-level industry and legal experts to discuss sector intelligence and best practice as well as issues ranging from cyber breaches and cryptocurrency wrangles to fall-outs over trade secrets and intellectual property (IP).“AI offers amazing opportunities to advance life sciences and usher in transformative medicine such as cell and gene therapy, improved diagnostics and analytics but it also comes with concerns as legal and contractual risks are still being understood and evaluated,” says Nick Beckett, Global Co-Head of CMS Life Sciences & Healthcare Sector Group“Science and technology are moving forward very quickly but we are finding that the detail and strategy of what to do to mitigate risks or resolve them is lagging behind. These are critically important issues that companies need to address and the Forum will examine the implications and solutions.”AI is booming and a recent report by analysts  Grand View Research forecast that the global AI in healthcare market will grow from its current value of $10.4 billion at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 38.4% from 2022 to 2030. AI is fast becoming a significant element of every aspect of healthcare and legal departments and business units are being challenged to respond. The Forum, which is being held in Brussels and online on Thursday, September 28, has a packed agenda covering technology transformation, Environmental, Sustainability and Governance, supply chain disruption, regulatory frameworks and the changing commercial landscape. The scale of challenge was evidenced in the recent CMS Technology Transformation: Managing Risks in a Changing Landscape report which revealed that 56% of corporate counsel and risk managers expect an increase in AI-related disputes, while 50% believe that the use of AI technologies will lead to risks and disputes that cannot currently be foreseen. Disputes will be driven by issues arising from IP and trade secrets, the use of AI, smart contracts, cryptocurrencies and cloud services, they be­lieve. “Or­gan­isa­tions are likely to see new types of risks and disputes emerge from the use of new technologies such as AI and crypto­cur­ren­cies. Many businesses are playing catch-up in understanding the risks associated with these new technologies,” says Lee Gluyas, Partner, CMS. “Whilst no business can eliminate risks completely, those that think ahead, plan early and actively manage risk will give themselves a substantial ad­vant­age.” The free to attend Forum will feature keynote speakers from the United Nations Health and Development Team, general counsel from leading pharma companies, Boston Consulting Group, financial services multinational Aon and CMS sector specialists. For further details or to attend, register here: https://cms. law/en/int/events/glob­al-life-sci­ences-health­care-for­um-2022.

Top speakers at the event are Werner Baumann, CEO of Bayer, Oliver Bäte, CEO of Allianz and Laura Rudas, Executive Vice President Strategy of Palantir TechnologiesCMS, a top ten international law firm...

A CMS team covering 11 jurisdictions, together with Colgate's US advisers, advised Col­gate-Pal­molive in its ca. EUR 1.5bn acquisition of Laboratoires Filorga Cosmétiques. Originally founded in France...