Biography: Product Liability Defence

Amanda is a partner in DLA Piper's litigation and regulatory practice and sector leader for life sciences in Australia. She has extensive commercial litigation, dispute resolution and regulatory experience, gained during a twenty year career spanning Australia and the UK.

Amanda specialises in the defence of product liability claims and group and class actions; advising on product risk, insurance and safety issues; and pharmaceutical regulation. She recently joined DLA Piper after eight years as a partner in Clayton Utz' product liability group. Amanda also practised at Lovells (now Hogan Lovells) in London for more than a decade, where she became a partner in their product liability group in 2000.

She has handled a wide range of complex, high profile and sensitive litigious and regulatory matters for Australian, British, American, Japanese and other international corporate clients and insurers. This has involved working with in-house counsel and external lawyers across multiple jurisdictions, in legal teams developing international defence strategies, and working with expert medical and scientific witnesses.

Amanda has advised manufacturers, other companies in the supply chain and their insurers on product liability claims, regulatory compliance and risk management across a range of industries, including pharmaceuticals and medical devices, household consumer products, transport and motor vehicles, telecommunications, and food and beverages.

She is experienced in product recall and safety issues, coronial inquests, clinical trials, and risk and reputational management for corporate clients and their insurers. Amanda advises pharmaceutical and medical device clients on all aspects of the product life cycle including pricing and PBS reimbursement; compliance with regulatory legislation and industry Codes; Medicines Australia Code of Conduct complaints and appeals; advertising and labelling of drugs; Administrative Appeal Tribunal appeals; registration of drugs; liaison with regulatory and industry bodies; and health and safety issues arising post registration.

Amanda is published and she speaks widely on biopharma issues, product liability and pharmaceutical regulation. She has been recognised in PLC's 'Which Lawyer'? Life Sciences (the law and leading lawyers worldwide) for product liability and regulatory areas, 2005-2011; in the Legal Media Group's Guide to the World's Leading Product Liability Lawyers from 2007 to 2011; in Who's Who of Australian Women from 2006 to 2011; and in the World's Who's Who of Women in 2010.

Amanda graduated from the University of Adelaide in 1981 with a Bachelor of Arts and in 1988 with a Bachelor of Laws (with honours by dissertation in International Law). Between those degrees, she completed her general nursing training and in the 1980s, worked as a registered nurse in both paediatric and adult hospitals.

Advising life sciences companies on product liability, regulatory, and product risk issues has enabled Amanda to combine her knowledge of health and pharmaceutical issues with the law. Amanda is a member of the Defence Research Institute; the Australian Product Liability Association; and the Australian British Chamber of Commerce.