Utham Chengappa

Mani Chengappa & Mathur is a boutique law firm which specialises in advising domestic and international businesses of all sizes on technology and outsourcing transactions, privacy and data protection, commercial transactions, employment law, intellectual property protection, commercialisation and licensing, and dispute resolution. We blend our legal skills with deep knowledge of business operations and risk management frameworks to provide clients with advice and representation that is practical and tailored to their unique needs while being legally sound.

The firm being has been regularly ranked over the last 7 years in the leading international legal directories for its capabilities in the TMT sector. The Chambers and Partners listing is available here and the Legal 500 listing is available here. The detailed Chambers and Partners profile of the firm, based on their internal research, can be found here.

We are regularly instructed by international law firms and corporations to assist on the Indian aspects of privacy and data protection. Our experience in working with companies which, and jurisdictions that, treat privacy very seriously allows us to advice our clients across the privacy, data protection and information security spectrum.

Our capabilities include:

• Adapting global privacy frameworks to the requirements of Indian law
• Understanding the need for data in the business
• Analysing privacy obligations from an Indian perspective in global/multi-jurisdictional business initiatives
• Auditing existing privacy frameworks to ensure suitability for business need
• Advising on suitable privacy and document retention policy options
• Drafting privacy, document retention and information security policies
• Dealing with data losses

Utham’s practice areas cover technology contracting, employment law, data privacy and intellectual property advisory.  His unique blend of experience enables him to take a holistic view of issues and provide business enabling advice to his clients.

Utham acts for clients on multi-jurisdictional outsourcing transactions, managed services agreements, software procurement, software as a service (SaaS) and cloud computing arrangements, licensing policies and strategies, product licensing agreement, services and consulting arrangements.

He also leads the firm’s employment law practice and advises clients on all types of employment related matters including policies, regulatory compliance, compensation and benefits, harassment and governance issues.

He has assisted various clients on compliances with data protection laws, including assisting clients in different industry verticals on putting in place privacy compliances, drafting required policies such as privacy and data security and classification policies, and advising on issues related to data breaches and mitigation of impact of such breaches.

Immediately prior to founding the firm, Utham was the global Head of Commercial Transactions with additional charge of Intellectual Property matters at Infosys Limited. At Infosys, Utham managed all of legal’s client and vendor facing activities. He also provided guidance on Indian law issues to the employment law team at Infosys legal. Having begun his career as a litigator, Utham was an entrepreneur in the online legal database space and a counsel at a corporate law firm where he advised clients on employment law and intellectual property matters in addition to his core commercial transactions practice before joining Infosys.

Utham was awarded a Client Choice Award 2016 in the Indian General Corporate category.

 Education
National Law School of India University: BA LLB (Hons) – 1999