Herbert Smith Freehills LLP houses a ‘highly talented and dedicated’ team which handles a broad range of issues including seed financings, patent protection, and merger control work. Alan Montgomery leads the team, often advising clients which occupy the biotech, generics and medtech spaces on commercial agreements and cross-border M&A issues. ‘Very thoughtful and high calibre’ patent litigator Sebastian Moore is particularly adept at acting in SPC-related matters, having appeared before the CJEU, while IP specialist Sophie Rich regularly acts for pharmaceutical companies in both contentious and non-contentious matters. The ‘superb’ Emily Bottle regularly appears before the European Patent Office, and is particularly knowledgeable in gene and cell therapies.

Legal 500 Editorial commentary

Testimonials

Collated independently by Legal 500 research team.

‘Always at the top to the game, particularly in life sciences.’
‘HSF's life sciences team contains many highly talented and dedicated people with specialist expertise in the field.’
‘Sebastian Moore is a very thoughtful and high calibre litigator, who always considers all the angles.'
'Very friendly, cohesive and knowledgeable team.’
'Sebastian Moore is superb. He will always put the client first. He considers the full picture and has a great deal of experience with global litigation, giving great strategic advice whilst always being on top of the details.'
'Emily Bottle is also superb. Highly experienced, able to sniff out an issue quickly and cut to the chase. She is highly organised and a great team leader.’
‘Emily Bottle provides sound advice across a wide range of IP areas that are relevant to us and is the go-to person.'

Key clients

Gilead Sciences, Inc
AbbVie, Inc
Roche
Genus plc
Abcam plc
Biotage AB
Johnson Matthey plc
CSL Behring
Sanofi
Biogen

Work highlights

Advised Biotage AB on its acquisition of Astrea Bioseparations, a chromatography solutions provider, from Gamma Biosciences.
Acting for Biogen in a global dispute in relation to patent matters relating to TECFIDERA, a treatment for multiple sclerosis.
Advised Gilead Sciences on UK proceedings relating to Gilead's HIV integrase inhibitor, bictegravir. The firm also advised on the coordination of Gilead's response to parallel proceedings brought by ViiV in a number of other European Patent Convention jurisdictions.

Lawyers

Hall of Fame

The lawyers at the very top of the profession, widely known and respected by peers and clients for their longstanding involvement in market-leading work.

Sophie Rich

Hall of fameHerbert Smith Freehills LLP

Leading individuals