What is a technology lawyer?

The tech world is expanding at an exponential rate and businesses are quickly introducing new products and features, expanding teams and engaging new suppliers. However, although technology evolves rapidly, the legal risks associated with it can be less obvious. A technology lawyer essentially uses their knowledge of established legal principles and applies this to new and emerging technologies.

Technology lawyers may come from a variety of legal disciplines, having typically built experience in intellectual property, corporate, financial regulation or commercial law. The commonality is being able to anticipate risk across a range of issues and a willingness to understand new businesses. A technology lawyer protects your company across several different areas of the law, not just one.

Where could a technology lawyer help?

While technology lawyers provide support on a lot of different levels, the three core areas are contracts, data protection and intellectual property. For businesses that may want to raise investment, having a lawyer with a background in corporate work is also recommended.

Contracts are a core part of the job. As a business, any time you are signing something, whether that be a software development agreement, cloud and hosting terms or IT outsourcing deals, there are important legal ramifications to what is agreed. Often these tend to read like normal commercial contracts until something goes wrong, at which point the clauses that matter are the ones most businesses skip past. These all need someone who understands not just contract law but how the underlying technology works. What happens if the supplier's platform goes down, who owns the code once the project ends, and what a vague term like "reasonable endeavours" actually means.

Data protection and cybersecurity sit in second. UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act cover almost everything a tech business does, from how customer data is collected to what happens after a breach. A technology lawyer advises on compliance, data-sharing agreements and incident response.

Finally, but equally as important for a business, is intellectual property. Who actually owns the software, algorithms and the data a product generates, how it can be licensed to others and how it is protected from competitors, is a key part of what a technology lawyer advises on.

Technology lawyers work across the business lifecycle, from the first supplier contract to an established company's outsourcing deal or cybersecurity incident. Clients can therefore range from early-stage founders to fintechs and retailers with e-commerce platforms. As such, the role often overlaps with contracts, consumer law, regulation and intellectual property.

When to bring one in

It is key to understand when to bring one in as much as knowing what they do. The earlier your business collaborates with a technology lawyer, the more assurance you have of avoiding pitfalls in due course. Any time you are launching a website or platform, licensing or developing software, or handling large volumes of customer data, you should think about consulting one.

Many issues that are created from using a generic contract template are cost effective to fix in advance, but a lot harder and more expensive to unwind afterwards.

If you are facing similar legal challenges or would like to discuss how we can assist, get in touch with our team.