While much of the country works from home we are providing more options for you to access your copy of Legal Business. Please see below for links to a limited version followed by a complete version. The complete version is only accessible to subscribers. Please make sure you are logged into the site to see the link.
Limited version Continue reading “Access your print copy online – LB303”
‘There’s finally a new wave of senior leadership and it’s in the form of smart women. Whatever the reason, I think it’s great that we have a number across the City right now.’
Natasha Harrison, deputy chair and managing partner of Boies Schiller Flexner
‘I don’t like the gender divide. Everyone should be treated equally. There are a lot of good male leaders out there too. It would really piss me off if I thought I was only appointed because I’m a woman.’
Female London law firm leader Continue reading “Women leaders: Women of the revolution”
It was the football story of the year – eclipsing even Lionel Messi’s move to PSG and football not quite coming home – almost beyond belief in its audacity. On Sunday 18 April, The Times broke a story that 12 leading clubs from England, Spain and Italy had agreed to break away from UEFA’s Champions League competition and launch their own independent format: The European Super League (ESL).
To say the proposals were unpopular is a gross understatement: the following 48 hours of football coverage on all networks was a non-stop barrage of condemnation from fans, players and pundits alike. Former Manchester United captain Gary Neville captured the mood of many when he attacked the 12 clubs live on Sky in a red-faced rant that accused them of arrogance and greed. Continue reading “European Super League: Caught offside”
A cursory glance at The Legal 500’s IP coverage – which was recently split into a distinct patents table alongside a trade mark, copyright and design table – makes for a head-scratching read. In a legal discipline that attracts sophisticated, technical expertise, fortune favours the innovative as much as the who’s who of the City elite, or indeed the prestigious US names that are continually encroaching on London territory in the corporate space.
But even within this diverse, cutting-edge practice area, comprising teams as unique as the clients instructing them, there is much contention as to which approach fits best in a rapidly changing environment. Continue reading “The Legal 500 IP: Validity in the opposition”
While much of the country works from home we are providing more options for you to access your copy of Legal Business. Please see below for links to a limited version followed by a complete version. The complete version is only accessible to subscribers. Please make sure you are logged into the site to see the link.
Limited version Continue reading “Access your print copy online – LB302”
‘There is such a sense that we need to walk the walk. More so than I’ve ever seen before. This has captured the attention of many senior management partners. People are now taking ESG and diversity and inclusion as seriously as anything else in the firm.’
The view of Doug Bryden, Travers Smith’s head of risk and operational regulatory, certainly chimes with attitudes to the environmental, social and governance (ESG) imperatives held by senior corporate lawyers interviewed for our inaugural ESG report. Continue reading “We good corporate citizens – ESG report”
The legal industry is still fragmenting. Pre-2008 it was an easier game: a buoyant economy, predictable government and a converging world flattened by globalisation and the internet. Law firms sought to be ‘global’ and ‘full-service’ and merged or opened offices accordingly. The business model was simple: bigger clients, bigger teams, higher utilisation, higher rates. Hold onto more rainmakers than your rivals and the fortifications of a professional monopoly took care of the rest.
What has evolved post-2008 is a buyers’ market that shows no signs of abating. ‘There’s more choice of providers now than ever,’ says Chris Fowler, general counsel (GC) of BT Technology. ‘Alternative providers have a far greater share of wallet. There’s more of them and a wider spread, and then you’ve got the Big Four coming into play. The key thing coming into focus now is choice.’ Continue reading “Arrested development – the legal innovation report”
‘It’s a snowball effect. Look at private equity (PE) – that used to be dominated by Clifford Chance (CC), Freshfields and Ashurst but now it’s US firms,’ warns Weil London head Mike Francies. ‘The same hasn’t happened in M&A yet but nearly all of the top US firms here are now trying to build it. In my view, in the same way that a range of top UK firms have fallen behind the Magic Circle, it’s inevitable that the Magic Circle will end up falling behind the US firms for global M&A.’
On the face of it, there’s nothing new about the top US firms’ assault on the City legal market. Having pushed remuneration packages up to eye-watering seven or eight figure sums for the most coveted names, their extensive hiring sprees and growing dominance in areas such as PE and leverage finance have been well documented. Continue reading “Legal 500 analysis – is the Magic Circle’s dominance in the UK M&A market under threat?”
After a succession of years in the public eye and with no lack of controversy in 2020, it was going to take something seismic to prevent the perennially relevant slew of misconduct claims dominating the law firm risk agenda. Last year, that seismic event happened, with the world plunged into chaos as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. Unsurprisingly, our annual risk and professional indemnity report with broker Marsh shows this has caused a serious shake-up of risk registers, with firms understandably more cautious about the potential data security pitfalls of enforced home working as well as reduced workforce availability.
Perhaps a less-predicted consequence of the pandemic, however, was the widespread rise to prominence that many law firm risk managers and general counsel (GCs) experienced last year. Suddenly, risk professionals became more integral to all aspects of the law firm business, making connections and having conversations in a way that did not take place before 2021. Continue reading “Going viral – Risk management and professional indemnity survey 2021”
