The Collective insights

With tech leaders publicly urging a slowdown in AI development until adequate safety guardrails are in place, the question is no longer whether artificial intelligence needs governing - but how, and how to do it well.

Good AI governance may not be glamorous, but it could determine which organisations make the most of AI. That was one of the key messages from Kate Jones, CEO of the Digital Regulation Cooperation Forum (DRCF), in her keynote speech at our recent AI Agenda conference.

In September, we hosted AI Agenda 2026, bringing together senior leaders, legal experts and innovators to explore what it takes to adopt AI safely, strategically and at scale. The conversation has moved beyond what AI might do to how organisations are actually using it, and this edition reflects the themes and discussions that emerged throughout the day.

Despite its reputation for softness, a particular kind of optimism is the most useful thing a leader can bring to bear in times of uncertainty. 

As organisations move from AI experimentation to implementation, the questions they face are equally changing: decisions about which tools to test or where AI might create efficiencies quickly become questions about how work should be organised, who should make decisions, where accountability sits and how people experience the change. At the same time, the longer-term impact of AI on jobs, skills and organisational structures remains uncertain, leaving leaders with important choices about how that transformation should unfold.

Much of the debate about AI and work has traditionally focused on capability: what the technology can do, which tasks it can automate and how quickly organisations can adopt it. But as organisations move from adoption to embedding, and from pilots to integration, the most important questions are shifting from what AI can do to what organisations choose to do with it. 

A new state-backed fund promises capital, supercomputing power, and fast-tracked visas for AI start-ups. Here is what leaders need to know.

Until now, corporate criminal liability in England and Wales has been notoriously hard to pin on a company itself. Prosecutors had the tough job of proving that the individuals representing the “directing mind and will” of the company intended the wrongdoing. If anything, that meant blame often “rolled downhill”: an individual got charged, the company walked away, and the corporate culture that produced the conduct was never on trial.

Intellectual property has long been recognised as a critical business asset, but the way organisations think about IP, and the expectations placed on those responsible for it, are changing. For many businesses, IP strategy is no longer something that sits quietly in the background until a filing deadline, dispute or transaction arises. Instead, it is becoming a visible part of how leadership teams think about growth, brand investment and risk.

For many years, the gender gap has been discussed primarily through the language of equality, representation and fairness. While these remain essential values, they no longer capture the full scale of what is at stake.

At the end of April, Lewis Silkin hosted the GALA Global Conference in London, bringing together nearly 200 advertising lawyers from around the world.

At a time when commercial strategy and legal reality don’t always sit in the same conversation, the organisations making the strongest decisions are those deliberately bringing them together. In this edition, we explore some of the forces reshaping how businesses protect value, drive growth and navigate change.

Businesses are striving to balance short‑term budgetary pressures and the longer‑term imperative to build resilient, sustainable real estate portfolios. The answer is to treat environmental, social and governance (ESG) priorities and climate resilience as core value drivers, rather than discretionary spend, a ‘nice to have,’ or a nod to the corporate’s green agenda.

Lewis Silkin’s Future @ Work 2026 report explores how organisations are navigating an era defined by accelerating uncertainty: rapid advances in AI, geopolitical instability, regulatory fragmentation, demographic shifts and changing workforce expectations are profoundly reshaping today’s business environment. As a result, uncertainty for senior leaders has become a permanent strategic condition.

This year, it’s one hundred years since one of Ernest Hemingway’s characters asked, “how did you go bankrupt?” The answer: “two ways” – “gradually and then suddenly.” This exchange from one of Hemingway’s classic novels sums up how change can creep up on us. And then suddenly, without warning, everything changes overnight.

From Agentic AI reshaping core business operations to regulators tightening their grip on digital platforms, the pace of change is accelerating. What should tech leaders, boardrooms, and in-house counsel be watching in 2026? Here are the trends and developments that will define the year ahead.

How do organisations align technical teams, legal experts and business leaders to create effective AI governance and responsible deployment without slowing down innovation or effective decision-making?

2026 has arrived with momentum. The pace of technological, regulatory and organisational change shows no sign of slowing, and for businesses navigating this landscape, adaptability and foresight have never been more essential.

Rupam Davé and Scott Foster from Lewis Silkin’s DCC and IP teams hosted a lively session at xCHANGE 2025 with Tobias Hooton of Stelia AI, Gabe Pereyra from Harvey AI, and Carolyn Jameson from Airalo. The discussion was a fascinating exploration of how to seize opportunities through innovation, with the panellists offering their insights into the future of AI and the ever-shifting landscape of technology.

At xCHANGE 2025, we heard from Jacqueline de Gernier (GWI), James Greenfield (Koto), Chris Macfarlane (Peloton) and Faye Cottingham (Bacardi-Martini), in a broad-ranging discussion moderated by our own Duran Ross and Francesca Ainsworth. Together, they explored how businesses can make agility and resilience core capabilities, as well as utilising AI and market knowledge, to maximise opportunity in a fragmented world.

Our first keynote at xCHANGE 2025 was a session led by Dominic Sandbrook, historian, author and co-host of the hugely popular podcast “The Rest is History”. 

At xCHANGE 2025, Lewis Silkin’s Joint Managing Partner, Jo Farmer, sat down with Debbie Wosskow,OBE - entrepreneur, investor, and leading voice on women’s economic empowerment - for a thought-provoking conversation.

xCHANGE 2025 brought together founders, investors, technology experts, GCs and brand leaders to reflect on a core question: how should businesses make decisions amid persistent disruption? Four themes stood out, offering timely insights: context matters; that trust, talent and inclusion are competitive assets; that innovation is the operating system and must be commercially-oriented, governed and protected; and that consumers are re coding value from transactions to relationships. Here are the key highlights and why they matter for organisations now.

Niel Bornman, CEO of Publicis Connected Media UK, shares how the group is blending its century-old North Star with data and AI to drive growth - from “Organisational Darwinism” to how proprietary data, agentic AI and talent development are driving competitive advantage.

In our latest The Collective Conversation, Perry Ellis Europe’s CEO, Carl Davies unpacks their blueprint for scale: think global, act local; invest in product, people, and platform; and harness AI to sharpen demand signals, streamline inventory, and build a healthier, higher performing organisation.

In a world shaped by global politics, rapid technological change, and shifting regulatory landscapes, businesses are navigating more complexity than ever. This issue explores how innovation, law, and policy are evolving and colliding across borders and industries.

Video game cheats and hacks are a major problem for game developers and publishers, particularly in online games. Cheats and hacks can ruin the multiplayer experience, and there is an ongoing struggle between cheat developers and games companies who seek to develop anti-cheat software to protect their gameplay experiences to retain players and protect the value of their investments. Such disruptions to an online community can damage a game’s reputation and, subsequently, its revenue. Effective policing of cheats and hacks also requires deploying a combination of legal and community measures, including intellectual  property rights and the  use of contractual terms.

As technological developments evolve, the legal landscape is keeping pace. Courts and regulators face new challenges, and disputes are rising as technology raises novel issues. We examine key drivers of technology disputes, legal solutions and emerging  trends in tech litigation.

In today’s global economy, competition to attract the most desirable talent is fierce with many countries seeking to improve their attractiveness. The UK’s Industrial Strategy, published in June 2025, acknowledges immigration as a key driver of economic growth and innovation, particularly in designated priority sectors. The strategy aims to attract international talent through a reformed immigration system, while also ensuring immigration policy aligns with the Government’s approach  to addressing national skills and training needs.

AI tools are rapidly transforming the creative industries, from the more mundane automating admin or de-mixing audio to the more innovative, such as enhancing ideation, creation of virtual environments or identifying emerging creative trends. But alongside the benefits comes a growing risk, a risk often called shadow AI. Shadow AI is the unauthorised or unmonitored use of AI tools by employees, often outside company-approved systems  or devices.

As part of SXSW’s first ever UK edition, Lewis Silkin brought together a packed room to hear five sharp minds – photographer-advocate Isabelle Doran, tech founder Guy Gadney, licensing entrepreneur Benjamin Woollams, Commercial partners Laura Harper and Phil Hughes – wrestle with one deceptively simple question:  is AI a hero or a villain in the creative world?

The AI Agenda, our flagship AI conference brought together Lewis Silkin’s Co-Heads of Data, Privacy & Cyber, Alexander Milner-Smith and Bryony Long, along with Sophia Ignatidou, Group Manager for AI Policy at the Information Commissioner’s Office, for an interesting discussion on global AI regulation and AI governance strategies. 

At Lewis Silkin’s recent conference, The AI Agenda, experts from the legal, technology, and creative sectors shared their perspectives on best practices, risks, and opportunities in the rapidly evolving AI landscape. From the outset, it was clear that AI is not a distant prospect - it is already transforming how we work, create, and make decisions.

What’s pizza got to do with AI? And what’s an AI agent?

In our latest edition we explore how artificial intelligence is reshaping industries - from healthcare to the creative economy. At the heart of our coverage is The AI Agenda conference, where leaders from the legal, creative, and technology sectors came together to discuss how AI is already reshaping the way we work, create, and make decisions.

We discussed last year that the creator economy continues to evolve at high speed. According to Goldman Sachs, the creator economy was valued at $250 billion globally in 2023 and is projected to reach $480 billion by 2027, growing at a compound annual growth rate of around 14%. 

Personalised medicine is an emerging healthcare approach that tailors medical decisions about the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of disease by drawing on the individual patient’s unique characteristics, including their genetic profile, biomarkers, lifestyle and environmental factors. 

Earlier this year, we published our annual "Tech Predictions for 2025" article in which we take a look at the major advancements in AI, robotics, health tech, blockchain, cybersecurity, and sustainable tech. Here, we summarise some of our key predictions and how they might impact the tech landscape during the rest of this year.

As workplaces adapt to rapid technological advancements, Artificial Intelligence (AI) stands at the forefront, offering both challenges and opportunities for businesses worldwide. According to Harvard Business Review, “40% of all U.S. work activity can be augmented, automated, or reinvented with generative AI.” Once limited to tech experts, AI is now accessible to everyone through intuitive tools that use everyday language rather than complex coding.

In today's eco-conscious world, companies are understandably eager to flaunt their green credentials. But beware: greenwashing - exaggerating or faking environmental efforts - is under the microscope, and not just by regulators.

Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) refers to software that is freely available to use, modify and distribute. Unlike proprietary software, which restricts access to its source code, FOSS promotes transparency and collaboration by granting users access to the underlying code. This freedom is essential for fostering innovation, as it lets developers worldwide improve upon the software and adapt it to meet specific needs.

This year is full of uncertainties – global economic and political fluctuations, rapid tech advancements and shifting regulation. Successful businesses will embrace the opportunities that uncertainty creates head-on. Join us as we explore key topics, offering expert insights to keep you ahead of the curve.

The creative industries stand at the heart of the UK’s economic future, contributing an impressive £125 billion to the economy and providing employment for over 2.3 million people. Equally transformative is artificial intelligence - both as an enabler of other industries, including the creative industries, and as a sector in its own right.

Artificial Intelligence has firmly established itself as a transformative technology, capable of revolutionising everything from mundane tasks to the development of smart cities. However, the rapid advancement and widespread adoption of AI have also sparked concerns about its inherent risks.

The Collective brings together diverse minds and insights from across industries to spark conversations, share ideas and build connections. We’re not about dense legal jargon or technical lectures; our goal is to explore opportunities and challenges in a collaborative, engaging space.

On Wednesday 13th November we held our flagship xCHANGE 2024 event – we’ve set out the key themes here. If you missed it, don’t despair, as we delve into the sessions in this summary.

The creative industries have shown remarkable growth, contributing £126 billion to the UK economy in 2022, a 6% increase since 2019. The sector employs at least 2.4 million people, The creative industries export £46 billion of goods and services each year, which is 14% of the UK's total services exports and is growing at a rate that exceeds the national average by more than a factor of three.