Expertise
Samuel Martínez leads the IS and Technology, Data Protection and Intellectual Property specialisms at the Madrid office. His team regularly assist startups, scaleups, SMEs, VC and PE firms, and multinational corporations, in complex cutting-edge projects and transactions in an international context encompassing intellectual property, technology and data.
Specialised in the roll out of cross-border data-driven innovative solutions and services in several sectors including Advanced Manufacturing, Health, Consumer and Retail, Financial Services -FinTech- or Energy & Utilities. He acts as trusted advisor on a wide range of IP matters such as registration, licensing, assignment, cease-and-desist letters, out-of-court settlements, and IP disputes before courts related to trade secrets, copyrights, patents, and trademarks. He is particularly active helping clients to navigate through the interplay of IP, artificial intelligence and blockchain in strongly regulated ecosystems where tech-based business and the setting up of a proper IP ownership scheme are always a challenge. He also assists clients, from a legal standpoint, in the framework of IP audits, valuation of IP assets, forensics, IP monetisation, spin-offs from universities and research centres, consortiums, IP related contractual/tax schemes and IP, data and image rights related issues in the sports business, encompassing great negotiation skills as deal lawyer with a relevant knowledge of technical aspects.
He assesses in the implementation of technology-based solutions in financial services (FinTech/Insurtech) -payments, crowdlending, crowdfunding, consumer credit, insurance distribution, and crypto- and traditional industries such as food, providing both commercial and regulatory advice.
He counts on more than 15 years of experience gained in leading Spanish, UK and Asian law firms assisting on data privacy (i.e. international data transfers, cloud computing, providing client assistance on penalty proceedings at the Spanish Data Protection Agency, whistleblowing schemes, cookies, monitoring employees' use of corporate e-mail and IT equipment), e-commerce, e-signature, e-invoicing, commercial and IT agreements (i.e. drafting and negotiation of outsourcing, software licensing and hardware acquisition agreements), cybersecurity, consumer law, advertising and marketing, as well as around telecommunications, audiovisual and online gambling regulatory issues.
He acts as legal arbitrator in the extrajudicial conflict resolution scheme for “.es” domain names managed by Adigital.
- Experience
Some examples of his work are:
- Advice to one of the major mobility platforms in a wide range of commercial and regulatory matters.
- Advice to one of the most prominent scaleups in the satellite and earth observation space on a wide range of commercial matters, including data protection and IP registration.
- Advice to one of the major IT consultancy firms in Europe around the legal issues related to the metaverse and the deployment of new business models.
- Advice to a leading cybersecurity firm in Europe in their business deployment in Spain, including the setting up of an adequate contractual structure.
- Advice to a leading marketplace around the practical implementation of the DSA and, particularly, the interplay with IP related legislation.
- Advice to several companies in the fulfilment of GDPR and their interaction with other rules applicable in third countries, data breaches, notifications to data protection authorities and penalty proceedings.
- Advice to a scaleup in the FinTech space on the deployment of their products and services in Spain, providing both regulatory advice and commercial advice around the interplay of AI and data protection.
- Publications
- Book chapter: “Actualidad Mercantil. Implicaciones legales del Machine Learning”. Tirant lo Blanch. (2019)
- Book chapter: “Actualidad Mercantil. El blockchain como activo”. Tirant lo Blanch. (2018)
- Book chapter: “Actualidad Mercantil – Nuevas Tecnologías: Los Drones”. Tirant lo Blanch (2018)
- Book chapter: “Responsabilidad de los intermediarios”. "El Derecho de Internet", Atelier (2016)
- Languages
- English
- Spanish
- French
- Education
- Executive Master's in Corporate Finance, Centro de Estudios Garrigues (2011)
- Executive Master's in Corporate Law, Centro de Estudios Garrigues and Harvard Law School (2009)
- Law Degree, Universidad Complutense de Madrid & Maîtrise en Droit, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (2007)
- Recognition
- Ranked in Best Lawyers on Information Technology Law and Privacy and Data Protection Law