With over 25 years of expe­ri­ence, I am a respect­ed transna­tion­al intel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty, infor­ma­tion tech­nol­o­gy, and data pro­tec­tion lawyer. 

I act in trans­ac­tions in which areas of intan­gi­ble assets play a key role and how they inter­act with pri­va­cy laws. I appear in lists of the Best Lawyers of Aus­tralia pub­li­ca­tions and fea­tures in Doyle’s Guide Lead­ing Intel­lec­tu­al Prop­er­ty Lawyer Rank­ing. I am also the co-author of Thom­son Reuters’ pub­lished texts Com­put­er Con­tracts Prin­ci­ples & Prece­dents and Rennie’s Inter­na­tion­al Com­put­er and Inter­net Con­tracts and Law.

Exper­tise

  • Com­mer­cial
  • Cyber
  • IP & Technlogy

Sec­tors

  • Pri­vate Clients & Fam­i­ly Businesses
  • Ser­vices Pro­fes­sion­al & Non-professional
  • Tech­nol­o­gy & Media 

Expe­ri­ence

  • Intel­lec­tu­al property
  • Infor­ma­tion technology
  • Media & enter­tain­ment laws
  • Cyber

Recent mat­ters in which I have been instruct­ed includ­ed manda­to­ry data breach scheme com­pli­ance, inter­na­tion­al trade­mark licences, alliance prod­uct launch­es, e‑publishing agree­ments, cloud com­put­ing con­tracts, pay tele­vi­sion pro­gram deals, data­base licens­ing arrange­ments, and mer­chant acquir­er transactions.

Roles, mem­ber­ships, and education

  • State chair (Qld) of the Law Coun­cil of Australia’s Intel­lec­tu­al Prop­er­ty Committee
  • Mas­ter of Laws degree
  • Post­grad­u­ate qual­i­fi­ca­tions in cor­po­rate gov­er­nance through Char­tered Sec­re­taries Australia
  • Mem­ber, Intel­lec­tu­al Prop­er­ty Com­mit­tee (Busi­ness Law) Law Coun­cil of Australia
  • Trade­mark Unit Lec­tur­er, Mas­ter of Intel­lec­tu­al Prop­er­ty, QUT.

Direct Contact

Speak with Legal Secretary

Publications

Copy­right and Gen­er­a­tive AI: what Aus­tralia can learn from the Meta and Anthrop­ic Rulings

In 2025, two U.S. court deci­sions, Kadrey v. Meta and Bartz v. Anthrop­ic, have pro­vid­ed the first real judi­cial answers…

Ope­nAI’s screen­less future on pause amidst trade mark dispute

Back­groundIn ear­ly May, Ope­nAI sur­prised the tech world with news of an esti­mat­ed $6.4 bil­lion part­ner­ship and acqui­si­tion involv­ing ​“io”…

Beware Retail Lease Dis­close Statements

Before a retail lease is entered into, the Retail Leas­es Act 1994 (NSW) (the RL Act) requires a land­lord to give a signed Lessor’s…

In the News

Anna Sharpe co-pre­sent­ed to the Mer­i­tas’ M+A & Pri­vate Equi­ty Group on ​‘Data Privacy’.

Yao Rao gave an update on recent changes to data and pri­va­cy laws in Chi­na and not­ed that pro­hi­bi­tions on…

James Skel­ton & Anna Sharpe are rep­re­sent­ing Swaab at the INTA 2023 Annu­al Meet­ing Live+ in Singapore

James Skel­ton & Anna Sharpe are rep­re­sent­ing Swaab at the Inter­na­tion­al Trade­mark Asso­ci­a­tion (INTA) 2023 Annu­al Meet­ing Live+ which con­nects the…

Per­son­al Data Pro­tec­tion | Free download

We are pleased to be the con­trib­u­tor for the Aus­tralian chap­ter in this 2nd Edi­tion of ​‘A Glob­al Roadmap to…

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