Benjamin M. Dean
Counsel

Mr. Dean is a counsel in Pillsbury's Global Sourcing group, helping clients negotiate and structure a broad range of complex sourcing and technology transactions. Mr. Dean also advises clients who are experiencing performance issues concerning their sourcing and technology projects and suppliers.

Mr. Dean’s practice includes negotiating and preparing software licensing, development, and implementation agreements; data center, information technology (IT), and business process outsourcing relationships, including payroll, accounts payable, human resources, help desk and back office outsourcings; offshore outsourcing arrangements; IT consulting agreements; software, hardware, and outsourcing requests for proposals; hardware and software procurement transactions; enterprise resource planning implementation and licensing agreements (e.g., SAP and Oracle); and Internet technology matters, including web site hosting, content, and Terms of Use agreements.

Mr. Dean also counsels businesses that are experiencing performance issues concerning their sourcing and technology projects and suppliers. Such work includes implementing new or revised service levels that can focus the attention of suppliers on specific practices important to the client, or helping clients negotiate a structured settlement to unsuccessful projects, if necessary.

He has advised both public and private sector clients, in industries as diverse as healthcare and life sciences, financial services, local government, energy, education, media, entertainment, communications, and real estate.

Mr. Dean's recently completed transactions include:

• Negotiation of an outsourcing agreement to consolidate a global financial planning company's various technology help desks into a single ITIL-compliant service desk.

• Outsourcing of world leading information corporation's data center/data processing services and implementation of a strategic marketing agreement, to promote its provision of customer data integration services to its customers.

• Negotiation of a global agreement for the provision of data processing services and consumer information for a division of a diversified technology, media and financial services company.

• Negotiation of a data center, applications development, and offshore outsourcing arrangement with IBM for a major US insurance claims processing company.

• Outsourcing of healthcare insurance company's data center, help desk, applications development and maintenance, desktop support and maintenance, and telecommunications functions to Dell Services.

• Negotiation of a software licensing and data center, help desk, applications development and maintenance, and telecommunications outsourcing with IBM for a healthcare insurance company.

• Outsourcing of a nonprofit education testing company's worldwide Information Technology infrastructure, along with re-architecture of the company's core business systems.

Mr. Dean also has litigation experience, and prior to joining the firm in 1998, he served as Law Clerk to the Honorable Donald E. Walter, U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana.

• Legal 500 US, Technology: Outsourcing (2010)