Ann LaFrance

Coordinating Partner, Communications Law & Regulation, EMEA; Global Co-Chair, Data Privacy & Cybersecurity, Squire Patton Boggs

Ann LaFrance is a partner in the London office of Squire Patton Boggs and a senior member of the firm’s Communications Law & Regulation Practice Group. She is responsible for coordinating the Group’s work for TMT clients in Europe, the Middle East and the Caribbean and co-chairs the firm’s global Data Privacy & Cybersecurity Group. Ann has over three decades of experience working as a regulatory and policy strategist with a focus on the ICT sector, including the related areas of competition law, cybersecurity, consumer protection and dispute resolution. Ann began her career in Washington, DC, where she specialised in telecommunications policy and regulation at a time of major sector restructuring in the US. From 1996-2004, she worked in-house as Chief International Counsel of MCI Communications Corp. (since acquired by Verizon) based in Brussels and London.Ann now serves as a regulatory strategist and trusted advisor to the senior executives and boards of telecommunications operators, internet and edge providers, regulatory authorities, governments and other industry stakeholders in Europe and around the world. Her experience includes substantial work on issues involving the allocation and assignment of spectrum as well as access and interconnection issues, functional and structural separation, net neutrality, margin squeeze, the regulation of M2M services, consumer protection, universal service and the application of the EU e-privacy rules to sector participants. Ann’s work has been recognised by Chambers, The Legal 500 and Who’s Who Legal: Technology Media & Telecommunications. She has also been selected as the exclusive winner of the UK Client Choice Award for telecommunications law in 2014 and 2015. Ann serves on the board of directors of the International Institute of Communications and as data protection advisor to the Storage Networking Industry Association – Europe.