Charles Kerrigan
The Blockchain Industry Landscape Overview in 2018 named Charles as one of the UK’s leading influencers on blockchain. He is the UK’s “recommended lawyer” for blockchain and digital technology in the UK Parliament Hub.
He is a lawyer specialising in finance and technology. He works on corporate finance and venture capital fundraising transactions for companies, funds, platforms and financial institutions. He works on consulting projects on blockchain, digital assets, AI and automation/transformation for public bodies, policy makers, standards institutions and corporations.
Charles sits on the Bank of England’s Financial Markets Law Committee on Virtual Currencies; he is a board member of the Innovators Board at the Big Innovation Centre, named Think Tank of the Year 2019.
He sits on the advisory boards of the UK All Party Parliamentary Group on Artificial Intelligence (APPG AI) and the UK All Party Parliamentary Group on Blockchain (APPG Blockchain).
In November 2019 Charles was a Special Consultee to the UK LawTech Delivery Panel’s Legal Statement on Cryptoassets and Smart Contracts. In summer 2020 he was an expert consultant to the UNCITRAL group on legal issues related to the digital economy.
He was a panellist and moderator at the LMA Fintech and Annual Conferences and the ISDA Technology Conference in 2019. He presented at the City University seminar: Blockchain and Cryptocurrencies, Economics, Finance and Law; and at the Future of Finance: Tokenised Assets, London.
He is Chair of the Technology Working Group of the Association of Real Estate Funds.
In the last 12 months Charles worked on some of the largest TMT M&A transactions in Europe; over 30 funding transactions involving IP and intangible assets as the primary collateral; multiple online platform financings; over 25 blockchain and tokenisation projects.
He lectures on these topics, including at LSE, UCL and City University.
Books:
- Practical Lending and Security Precedents - General Editor (Sweet and Maxwell, 2020)
- Growing with Blockchain (Co-author, Novaro Publishing, 2020)
- The Financing of Intangible Assets, TMT Finance and Emerging Technologies (Butterworths, 2019)
- Responsible AI (Co-author, ILTA, 2019)
- Cash Pooling and Insolvency: A Practical Global Handbook (Globe 2012)
Press and Journals:
The Times; The Guardian; City AM; Journal of International Banking and Financial Law; Bloomberg UK Financial Services Law Journal; E-Finance and Payments Law and Policy; Financier Worldwide; International Accountant.
Recent Feature Articles:
- Artificial Intelligence and Equity; Artificial Intelligence and Uncertainty; Artificial Intelligence and Fallibility, a series (JIBFL 2018/19)
- Laws and Legal principles relating to Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technologies: A Taxonomy (JIBFL 2019)
- Tokenisation and Digital Assets: Blockchain in Capital Raising (JIBFL 2020)
Practice Areas
Panels
- Consulting Editorial Board
- Contributing Author
- Other Publications
2 Contributions by Charles Kerrigan
PRACTICE NOTES
Security over intellectual property under English law: lender-focused practical guide to due diligence, creation, registration and enforcement across patents, trade marks, copyright and designs
Introduction
It is ever more accepted that every enterprise holds and deploys some form of IP. Financiers active in markets with IP-heavy companies are paying closer attention to making sure their collateral captures the worth embodied in that IP. The legal position on taking security over IP remains unsettled, requiring lenders to navigate ambiguity. Moreover, charging IP rights can be expensive to establish and challenging to realise. A funder must begin by pinpointing and assessing the borrower’s IP. It should differentiate categories of IP, for instance rights with proprietary attributes and those arising under contracts. It should also appreciate that a firm’s IP is typically interconnected, such as a patent and the related know-how that gives the patent practical value. Finance lawyers must likewise consider the intrinsic nature of the IP and the setting from which its value derives. A central issue is how the lender could monetise the IP if the security is enforced. This assessment underpins any practical and effective approach to enforcing the security. Resolving that in each situation demands insight into how the borrower conducts its business and the role IP plays within it...
IP
CHECKLISTS
Assumptions checklist for English law legal opinions in unsecured bilateral loan transactions, with secured and cross-border supplements
This Checklist concerns English law legal opinions customarily delivered by a lender’s solicitors as a condition precedent to drawdown of a loan facility. It proceeds, in particular, on the basis that the facility is bilateral, the lending bank is incorporated in the UK (United Kingdom) as lender, and the addressee of the opinion is the Lender, being the law firm’s client. It further proceeds on the footing that the Borrower is a company incorporated in England and Wales, the transaction documentation, upon which the opinion is given, is governed by English law, and the underlying loan is unsecured, without any security interests being taken. For assumptions typically included where security is granted, or where the transaction has a cross‑border element, see Additional assumptions to be considered where the loan is secured and Additional assumptions to be considered where the transaction has a cross‑border aspect below. It forms part of a set of checklists relating to legal opinions. The other Checklists are as follows:
English law legal opinion-qualifications checklist, and
Checklist for reviewing a foreign law legal opinion
The purpose of assumptions in a legal opinion
A legal opinion is founded on specified assumptions, addressing matters that the law firm cannot...
Banking & Finance
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