Bond Dickinson has made up to five voluntary redundancies in its Bristol office after the firm lost out on a panel spot with Australian insurer QBE.
In a statement, the firm said: ‘Earlier this year following on from a panel loss we had to undertake a restructuring exercise with our professional risks team which resulted in voluntary redundancies. Fortunately, all of those solicitors who have now left the firm are moving on to new roles.’
In October last year, Legal Business revealed that QBE was launching a review of its UK claims panel, following the appointment of Carol Scobie as group general counsel and company secretary in January 2016.
The UK panel, which was last reviewed in 2014, is responsible for carrying out a large amount of disputes work for the insurer. The last UK review was overseen by then European claims director Dominic Clayden, now group chief claims officer, with firms including Berrymans Lace Mawer, Mayer Brown, Plexus Law and RPC making the list.
Just last week, Bond Dickinson announced that it was combining with its US strategic alliance partner Womble Carlyle Sandridge & Rice to create a new transatlantic law firm and UK top 20 firm with £340m in combined revenues.
The new firm, Womble Bond Dickinson, will launch on 1 October 2017. More than 420 partners and 1,000 lawyers will work across its eight UK offices, and 15 US offices, including London, Newcastle and Bristol, and Washington D.C., Atlanta, Charlotte.
The combined mid-market firm will focus on 12 key sector groups, including energy and natural resources, healthcare, insurance, real estate, retail and consumer and pharma and life sciences.
kathryn.mccann@legalease.co.uk
