Jocelyn Paulley > Gowling WLG > London, England > Lawyer Profile
Gowling WLG Offices

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Jocelyn Paulley

Position
Director
Career
“Jocelyn has an excellent attention to detail, good client communications and I can’t fault her on timely delivery of tasks agreed.”
Seftton Samuels, November 2014
Jocelyn Paulley helps clients to see the wood for the trees! She has experience on large projects involving multiple vendors working for a customer to deliver a single, on-going service where the challenge is to monitor the big picture (to mitigate risks for the customer) at the same time as marshalling the detail (to ensure that all the individual services dovetail and create a coherent service).
She also helps clients to cut through lengthy negotiations using her knowledge of market practice to get to the end result for clients faster. Her experience negotiating with the IT giants saves clients time when embarking on procurements as she can navigate them away from dead-ends and towards areas where gains can be made or where protection is required. She knows how to work through the complex and unusual licensing structures created by the major software vendors and how to navigate their internal governance process.
Jocelyn can help clients to understand the technical set-up, limitations and reality of IT services. This is key to negotiating IT-related agreements and Jocelyn has a good appreciation of technologies and the industry jargon through regular interaction in the world of tech start-ups and acting for suppliers.
Clients value her pragmatic, commercial approach and ability to work with everyone across a business, as well as maintaining a good relationship with the other side to see negotiations through to the end.
Highlights
Jocelyn’s personal highlight was seeing the new M&S.com website launch in February of 2014. She had been closely involved, alongside the in-house team, with the programme that delivered the website (as one of the overall programme’s ‘channels’ for interaction with consumers) over the previous two years and was active in all of the major procurement strands.
The team at M&S delivering the programme was so large that they had taken over a new premise, and it was exciting going there for meetings and seeing the ‘real’ work being done developing the systems and integrations, with a large count-down clock reminding everyone of the deadline.
Knowing all the hard work that went into the procurement and the long discussions about incentivising behaviours to deliver to M&S’s targets, it was thrilling to see the final product.
Clients
Jocelyn’s clients include:
- customers of IT services, particularly retailers and banks, procuring all manner of software, systems, support, hosting
- suppliers and customers of SaaS, cloud, hosted services
- data centre operators
- connected health suppliers
Experience
Acting alongside in-house legal for a large internal project to revamp logistics and supply-chain software for Arcadia Group. When knitting together different software solutions from different vendors with legacy systems, timing, communication and understanding the landscape and dependencies are critical. By entering into contracts that enabled repeat contracting for scopes of work, we were able to give the business flexibility to contract for what they wanted when they wanted. Our continued involvement meant we could bring lessons learned and known risks from one negotiation into the next to ensure a consistent approach and set of standards requirements across Arcadia’s contracts.
Concluding a managed service agreement for a telecoms operator for its backhaul circuits where the financial and accounting structuring drove the structure of the deal and was critical for both parties. By immersing ourselves in the technical detail of the service, we were able to e…
Languages
English
Lawyer Rankings
London > Industry focus > TMT
The commercial, IT and outsourcing team at Gowling WLG is led by Birmingham-based expert Jocelyn Paulley, who specialises in non-contentious IT matters, with particular experience advising clients in the retail and technology sectors, as well as co-leading the data privacy and cybersecurity team on the non-contentious side. Commercial litigator Patrick Arben, also based in Birmingham, leads on contentious IT matters, while corporate expert and technology group co-chair David Brennan focuses on M&A and equity capital funding work.
London > TMT (technology, media and telecoms) > IT and telecoms
Gowling WLG has both contentious and non-contentious IT practices. On the non-contentious side, it handles cloud computing, e-commerce, data protection and privacy, outsourcing and software development projects, licensing issues, and systems implementation and integration work, as well as M&A transactions. Jocelyn Paulley heads up the non-contentious practice with expertise in the retail and technology sectors, advising on outsourcing and SaaS projects. Commercial litigator Patrick Arben specialises in the technology sector, acting for both customers and providers of technology in disputes. Matt Hervey is also of note, heading up the AI team.
London > Industry focus > Retail and consumer
The sizeable team at Gowling WLG advises retailers across all legal disciplines including handling competition, construction and IP matters. The team is co-led by John Coldham and Jocelyn Paulley, who moved into the role in March 2022; the pair took over from former head Chris Hunt, who focuses on real estate mandates. Coldham is well regarded for his expertise in both IP strategy and litigation, while Paulley acts for both established retail brands and start-ups, and leverages her data protection knowledge to oversee digital infrastructure mandates. Kate Swaine is also recommended for IP work and Sarah Riding handles commercial matters.
West Midlands > TMT (technology, media and telecoms) > IT and telecoms
With a specialty in non-contentious IT work, Gowling WLG handles an array of work including data protection, freedom of information, cloud computing and e-commerce. Jocelyn Paulley has acted on major outsourcing projects and co-chairs the firm’s data centre practice. David Brennan acts for tech start ups at the beginning of their life cycle and focuses primarily on mergers and acquisitions.
Lawyer Rankings
- Retail and consumer - London > Industry focus
- IT and telecoms - London > TMT (technology, media and telecoms)
- TMT - London > Industry focus
Top Tier Firm Rankings
- Investment fund formation and management > Listed funds
- Projects, energy and natural resources > Water
Firm Rankings
- Corporate and commercial > Commercial contracts
- Dispute resolution > Commercial litigation: mid-market
- Real estate > Commercial property: development
- Real estate > Commercial property: investment
- Corporate and commercial > Equity capital markets – small-mid cap
- Projects, energy and natural resources > Infrastructure
- TMT (technology, media and telecoms) > Intellectual property: patents (contentious and non-contentious)
- TMT (technology, media and telecoms) > Intellectual property: trade marks, copyright and design
- Industry focus > Life sciences and healthcare
- Employment > Pensions (non-contentious)
- Employment > Pensions: dispute resolution
- Industry focus > Retail and consumer
- Real estate > Commercial property: corporate occupiers
- Real estate > Construction: contentious
- Real estate > Construction: non-contentious
- Industry focus > Emerging markets
- Corporate and commercial > EU and competition: trade, WTO anti-dumping and customs
- Crime, fraud and licensing > Fraud: civil
- Employment > Health and safety
- Public sector > Healthcare
- Projects, energy and natural resources > Mining and minerals
- Real estate > Planning
- Projects, energy and natural resources > Power (including electricity, nuclear and renewables)
- Real estate > Property litigation
- Transport > Rail
- Investment fund formation and management > Real estate funds
- Private client > Contentious trusts and probate
- TMT (technology, media and telecoms) > Fintech
- TMT (technology, media and telecoms) > IT and telecoms
- Corporate and commercial > M&A: lower mid-market deals, £50m-£500m
- TMT (technology, media and telecoms) > Media and entertainment (including media finance)
- Corporate and commercial > Private equity: transactions - mid-market deals (up to £250m)
- Real estate > Property finance
- Real estate > Social housing: finance
- Industry focus > TMT
- Corporate and commercial > Venture capital
- Public sector > Administrative and public law
- Dispute resolution > Banking litigation: investment and retail
- Real estate > Environment
- Corporate and commercial > EU and competition
- Corporate and commercial > Financial services: contentious
- Corporate and commercial > Financial services: non-contentious/regulatory
- Dispute resolution > International arbitration