Sean Murphy
Global head of FinTech
Norton Rose Fulbright LLP
Related services and key industries
Biography
Sean Murphy is a corporate lawyer based in London. He is the global head of our FinTech practice and is head of our Technology and Innovation practice in EMEA.
Sean advises on a broad range of corporate matters including public and private mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, private equity buy-outs and venture capital and growth equity investments.
Sean has extensive experience of advising on investments in, and acquisitions of, technology businesses. He has worked in Silicon Valley and is very familiar with the unique dynamics of transactions in the technology sector.
Sean also advises on the development and deployment of financial services technology and on investments, acquisitions and joint ventures in the FinTech sector. He advises clients across the FinTech ecosystem including start-ups and mature technology companies, VC and PE firms, financial institutions, consortia and industry associations. He is widely regarded and recognized for his FinTech experience and is the co-chair of the US Chamber of Digital Commerce's Smart Contracts Alliance. Sean is frequently sought after to speak at conferences in the UK and the US and for commentary in the press.
Professional experience
Collapse all- Solicitor, qualified in England & Wales
Technology sector:
- Symphony Technology Group - on its £99.6m recommended bid for Kewill plc, the trade and logistics software provider.
- SuccessFactors - on the European aspects of its $3.4bn sale to SAP.
- Kleiner Perkins and Institutional Venture Partners - on several rounds of investment in Shazam Entertainment Limited, the smartphone-based music identification service, and on the sale of Shazam to Apple, Inc..
- NetScout Systems, Inc. - on the acquisition of Psytechnics, a leading provider of performance management technology.
- Scottish Equity Partners and management - on the £39.4m sale of Control Circle, a provider of complex managed hosting and cloud-based services, to Alternative Networks Plc.
- The founders of Sabio - on a management buyout that saw Lyceum Capital acquire a majority stake in the contact centre specialist in a deal valued at £50m.
- Imperial Innovations and the other shareholders of Permasense Limited, a provider of nonintrusive corrosion monitoring technologies - on the sale of Permasense to Emerson Electric.
- Oracle Systems Corporation - on the acquisition of Advanced Visual Technologies Limited.
- Barloworld - on the sale of its Barloworld Logistics supply chain software division to LLamasoft, Inc.
- Tiger Global Management - on its investment in Alex & Alexa, the online retailer of luxury brands for children.
- CGI - on the sale of its rFrame regulatory reporting product suite to Wolters Kluwer.
- The shareholders of Q-go - on its sale to RightNow Technologies, Inc.
- NGEN Partners - as lead investor in a US$12m investment in nlyte Software Limited.
FinTech sector:
- Northern Trust - on a joint venture with SC Ventures (the innovation and ventures unit of Standard Chartered) to launch Zodia Custody, an institutional-grade custody solution for cryptocurrencies.
- A significant client - on its potential membership of the Diem Association (the association founded by Facebook to launch the Libra digital currency).
- The Web 3.0 Technologies Foundation - on the launch of the Polkadot network, one of the most high profile crypto projects in the world, being led by Gavin Wood who was one of the founders of Ethereum.
- The VAKT consortium of energy companies (BP, Statoil and Shell), energy trading companies (Koch, Gunvor and Mercuria) and banks (ABN Amro, ING and Societe Generale) - on the formation of a first of its kind block chain-enabled post-trade management platform.
- Project Tracr, a ground-breaking blockchain platform being developed by De Beers, which provides a first-of-its-kind digital register for diamonds to ensure authenticity, traceability and accountability across the diamond value chain.
- A global investment bank - in relation to a financial technology platform that leverages R3's distributed ledger technology, Corda, to provide liquidity management and collateral management solutions for institutional clients in the global securities financing markets.
- Five investments banks - on the formation of a consortium to develop a global trade finance platform based on the IBM blockchain platform.
- Revenio Capital - on its role as lead investor in a £35m Series A financing round in Fly Now Pay Later, a London-based payment provider for the travel sector.
- ValueAct Capital - on its £1.2bn consortium bid with CVC Capital Partners for Misys Plc, the banking software provider.
- IRIS Software Group - on the acquisition of Cascade Human Resources Limited, a leading provider of HR and payroll solutions.
- NYSE Technologies - on the acquisition of Metabit, a leading Tokyo based provider of high performance market access products throughout Japan and Asia.
The Best Lawyers in the United Kingdom™ (2025 Edition) - FinTech
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