Businesses increasingly use outsourcing as a strategic catalyst for transformation. Clients need to rely on experts in the field to navigate the complexities of outsourcing transactions.
Our global TMT group has market leading experience and expertise in providing support to customers, suppliers, private companies and governments for outsourcing and offshoring projects. The team has advised clients across a wide range of sectors, so they can share their market knowledge and best practice. This has provided us with a valuable understanding of both the legal and commercial issues which help create not just a good deal for our clients on signing a deal, but throughout the term of the contract.
It has also enabled us to develop expertise in relevant specialist areas such as financial services regulation, tax, structured finance, data protection, employment law, intellectual property, procurement regulations and competition law.
Our TMT lawyers have expertise in all aspects of outsourcing and offshoring, including IT and infrastructure, BPO, F&A, customer contact, supply chain management, engineering, facilities management, real estate and vehicle fleet management outsourcings. We have also helped create some of the largest shared service centres for clients, including KPMG and JPMorgan.
Complex, multi-jurisdictional transactions or those with significant regulatory challenges are a particular area of strength for the team. Additionally, we have a dedicated India practice group and a close association with pre-eminent local firm Talwar Thakore & Associates. Linklaters is particularly well known for its experience of offshoring projects in India and is the only international law firm with top tier ranking in the directories for our India practice.
Recent outsourcing transactions include advising:
- BP on its £1.5 billion IT outsourcing transaction with five major IT suppliers
- J.P. Morgan on its high profile outsourcing deal by the Department of Work and Pensions and UK Post Office, including the Post Office Card Accounts, affecting all UK state benefit recipients of more than 4 million people
- the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA) on the early ending of its contract with ETS Europe for the provision of national curriculum test operations
- Vodafone on the outsourcing of its global application development and management functions of key IT systems to EDS and IBM, a project worth a total of €4 billion
- InBev on the drafting and negotiation of a pan-European application services management outsourcing agreement with LogicaCMG
- Equens SE on the acquisition of the payment processing business of ICBPI and provision of related services on behalf of ICBPI
- HypoVereinsbank on the sale and outsourcing of the custody and clearing business to CACEIS
- Pioneer Investment on the outsourcing of the funds administration to Société Générale
- a major Dutch-based international bank on three separate global outsourcings in relation to the provision of mobile telephony, PBX systems and managed data networks and firewall services with a contract value of over £1 billion
- DHL on the business-critical global outsourcing and offshoring of its finance and accounting operations to Hewlett Packard involving the transfer of up to 750 full-time employees, making it one of the largest business process outsourcings of its kind
- AB Storstockholms Lokaltrafik on the largest outsourcing deal in Europe (excluding the defence sector) with a value of SEK 37 billion (approx £3.5 billion) involving the operation of traffic services, maintenance and station services, including ticket sales and cleaning, for Stockholm underground
