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Alison co-heads our international life sciences team.
Alison is recognised as a top regulatory and transactional life science lawyers in Europe and is qualified in England & Wales and the Irish Republic. She works with mid-sized and large pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturers, helping them to design new product offerings to meet regulatory requirements and to facilitate product commercialisation across the UK and EU. Alison frequently negotiates optimal positions for pharma and medical device companies with regulators such as competent authorities, notified bodies, and industry bodies with voluntary codes.
Alison’s analytical understanding of strategy and business, which comes from over 25 years helping hundreds of life sciences companies manage the range of legal challenges that arise in putting medicinal products and medical devices on the market has encompassed corporate, competition, IP and compliance with anti-bribery laws and codes. She applies this breadth of knowledge to help companies achieve their business goals at the same time as regulatory and compliance requirements and she is consequently known for providing highly pragmatic advice.
Alison's recent experience includes advising:
Thomson Reuters, Stand-out Lawyers 2022 - Identified by in-house lawyers as one whom they rated above all others that they interact with.
Since 2020 | Partner, Taylor Wessing |
2008 - 2020 | Partner & head of life sciences, Fieldfisher LLP |
1996 - 2008 | Associate to Partner, Reed Smith |
1996 | Admitted as a solicitor, England & Wales |
1994 | LPC, York Law School |
1993 | Masters, Law & Economics, University of Oxford (including Hamburg University & Erasmus University, Rotterdam) |
1992 | LLB (Hons) European Legal Studies, Law University of Bristol (including University of Rouen, Fance) |
Pharmaceutical Advertising 2022, Chambers Global Practice Guides, April 2022 Advertising medical devices in the EU – do the MDR and IVDR represent a change in EU law?, Journal of Medical Device Regulation, February 2020 Eudamed timelines: unravelling contradictory legislation to understand how the deadlines apply – a lawyer’s view, Medtech Insight, November 2019 The EU Medical Devices Regulation and In Vitro Diagnostic Medical Devices Regulations, Lexis PSL, November 2019 Distribution and marketing of drugs in England, Thomson Reuters Practical Law, November 2019 Distribution and marketing of drugs in the EU, Thomson Reuters Practical Law, November 2019 Commercialisation of healthcare in the EU, Thomson Reuters Practical Law, November 2019 Commercialisation of healthcare in England, Thomson Reuters Practical Law, November 2019 Complying on time with MDR/ IVDR: what options are open to those in trouble?, Medtech Insight, November 2018 |
Chair/vice-chair, legal & compliance committee, Association of British HealthTech Industries (ABHI), since 2013 Trustee and company secretary, Bede House Charity, 2008 - 2013 Regulatory Affairs Professional Society (RAPS) The Organisation for Professionals in Regulatory Affairs (TOPRA) |
French |
Latest news & insights
Updated post-market surveillance (PMS) rules for medical devices in the UK: differences from the EU regulations
by Alison Dennis and Alice Matthews
Making sense of timelines and certificate extensions for placing medical devices on UK and EU markets
Regulating AI as a medical device in the UK
by Alison Dennis and Nicholas Vollers
IVDR extended transition period: What it means for IVD manufacturers