Legal Business

Losing QCs: BLP’s plan to compete with the Bar hit by another advocacy exit

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Litigation Berwin Leighton PaisnerKing & Spalding
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Stuart Isaacs QC, the man brought in to lead Berwin Leighton Paisner‘s advocacy unit and compete with the Bar, has departed for King & Spalding.

Berwin Leighton Paisner launched its advocacy unit, to much fanfare, at the start of 2011. Isaacs was brought in to lead the unit, arriving from South Square barristers’ chambers, and his exit is the latest blow to an already depleted team.

Just last month, the brains behind the operation, head of arbitration Nicholas Fletcher QC, departed for 4 New Square. An influential board member, Fletcher launched the strategy to take disputes ‘from instruction to trial’.

The exit of two of the firm’s three Queen’s Counsel in just two months has hit that strategy hard with head of charities Janet Turner QC lacking experience with corporate work.

BLP said in a statement: ‘BLP will continue its focus on providing fully integrated dispute resolution services to its clients, including trial advocacy. We have nearly 30 solicitor advocates, partners who sit as arbitrators and part time as judges, and we have increasingly been conducting advocacy in International Arbitration particularly in London, Moscow, Abu Dhabi and Singapore. We intend to continue to build our team of senior trial lawyers/advocates.’

For King & Spalding, Isaacs becomes the firm’s second Queen’s Counsel this year, with head of arbitration Tom Sprange having been appointed as QC earlier this month. Isaacs has chaired the advocacy in over 200 commercial cases during a 30-year career and was the first London QC authorised by the Singapore Attorney General to practice as a foreign lawyer. He sits regularly as an arbitrator and is a deputy judge of the High Court of England and Wales.

Isaacs said that ‘King & Spalding has a superior disputes practice’ and announced that he plans to create the ‘one-stop-shop’ for disputes that BLP failed to realise. ‘I am glad to be partnering with King & Spalding’s talented, entrepreneurial team of lawyers who share my vision,’ he added.

He is the firm’s fourth partner hire in London since the start of October and the fourteenth disputes lawyer in the City office. King & Spalding hired capital markets duo Markus Bauman from Latham & Watkins and Tom O’Neill from Linklaters at the end of 2014. It also persuaded Bingham McCutchen restructuring partner Elisabeth Baltay to join King & Spalding rather than follow the exodus of that office to Akin Gump Strauss Hauer Feld.

‘Stuart enhances our disputes offering in London and Europe, as well as in Asia, where he has a fantastic reputation,’ said Reggie Smith, global head of King & Spalding’s disputes group. ‘He will contribute significantly to developing new business in London and securing opportunities that require strong advocacy at trial.’

tom.moore@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Old or new BLP: Which way will the firm turn with its next managing partner?

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Leadership Berwin Leighton Paisner
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Berwin Leighton Paisner‘s (BLP) head of employment Lisa Mayhew will face off against corporate chief David Collins in the battle to replace Neville Eisenberg (pictured), the firm’s managing partner for the last 16 years.

Eisenberg, who is set to finish his fifth term as managing partner on 30 April, has already announced his intention to replace Harold Paisner as senior partner late last year.

One partner described the two-person shortlist as a ‘battle of old BLP versus new BLP’, with Collins putting forward a vision to return the former glories of the firm’s finance and corporate groups, while Mayhew hopes to continue the firm’s successful push in real estate.

Mayhew, who was elected head of the firm’s employment, pensions and incentives practice in late 2013, has been a board member for the past two years and was the driving force behind the firm’s commitment to make 30% of the partnership female by the end of 2018.

She has close relationships with head of real estate Chris de Pury, who backed her gender diversity target amid criticism from other parts of the firm, and chairman Robert MacGregor.

MacGregor, who was parachuted in from Clifford Chance in 2004 to resurrect what was at the time a flagging real estate team, is known to be backing Mayhew. One partner told Legal Business: ‘Lisa is a good political operator. She’s very well liked and would tow the Robert line. The support of Chris de Pury could be crucial as he could be the kingmaker. He calls a lot of the shots.’

Highlighting the contrast between the two, a source at BLP said: ‘David Collins is not MacGregor’s man. Collins represents old BLP and he has more power now than he did have following the exits of several senior partners last year.’

Collins, who has been a partner at BLP since 1996, has also been on the board for the last two years, gaining a seat when he was appointed head of corporate in April 2013. He has been involved in the firm’s strategy for longer than Mayhew, having sat as a member of the firm’s strategy group, a position he gained when he was made head of corporate finance in 2001.

tom.moore@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Accounts revealed: Berwin Leighton Paisner profits rise 26% after headcount cutback

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Financial results 2013/14 Berwin Leighton Paisner
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Accounts filed at Companies House have revealed Berwin Leighton Paisner made a strong financial recovery in 2013/14, with profit after tax rising 26% to £66.3m for the financial year, up from £52.4m in 2012/13, as the firm captured a greater volume of work and trimmed the size of its workforce.

Staffing cuts announced in 2012 failed to produce the 15% savings expected, with wages and salaries costs only falling 4% from £90.7m in 2012/13 to £87.1m in 2013/14. Focusing on London however, wages and salaries fell 9% – and 12% on an annualised basis – from £67.4m in 2013 to £61.5m in 2014. A BLP spokesperson, regarding the remaining shortfall, said: ‘Towards the end of last year there were headcount additions made to different areas of the business, stripping these out will give us a saving of around 15%.’

The firm cut 10% of its support staff in the year to 30 April 2014, with headcount falling from 658 to 589, other staff costs rose from £3.9m to £9.3m as redundancy pay-outs mounted. The number of partners at the firm also fell, from 179 on 30 April 2013 to 167 the following year with the highest paid partner at the firm receiving £1.2m, the same amount as in 2013.

After a substantial increase in its debt in 2012/13, BLP managed to pay off £13m in bank loans in the year to 30 April 2014, helping to bring its net debt down from £34.6m in 2012/13 to £29.25m in 2013/14. This resulted in a sharp fall in cash at bank and in hand from £12.4m in 2012/13 to £6.2m in 2013/14.

The firm was forced to pay out more interest on its debt, with costs rising nearly 50% from £667,000 in 2012/13 to £993,000 in 2013/14 while its bank overdraft was increased from £371,000 to £1.86m.

The filing also showed that the firm currently has a 70% stake in Lawyers on Demand, the flexible rent-a-lawyer service that spun out of BLP, and holds 80% voting rights.

tom.moore@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

16 years in the role: Neville Eisenberg to step down as BLP managing partner

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Leadership Berwin Leighton Paisner
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Berwin Leighton Paisner’s longstanding managing partner Neville Eisenberg (pictured) is set to step down from the role after 16 years in the post.

Eisenberg, who was unopposed in 2012 when he was re-elected for a fifth term as BLP’s managing partner, recently announced to the partnership that he would not be standing for re-election when his term ends at the end of April 2015. Legal Business understands that one of the firm’s name partners, Harold Paisner, is looking to relinquish his post as senior partner, which Eisenberg will then seek.

Also chairman of the British Israel Law Association, Eisenberg is one of the longest serving managing partners in the legal sector. His decision to step down from the role will result in the first change in senior management at the firm since the merger of Berwin Leighton and Paisner in 2001, when Eisenberg and Paisner were installed as managing partner and senior partner respectively.

After a turbulent period following the financial crisis that saw BLP’s attempt to gain ground on the Magic Circle and improve the size of its mandates fail, Eisenberg guided the firm to improved revenue and profits per partner in the last financial year. Having untangled itself from long guarantees for incoming partners marketed as rainmakers, revenue recovered to £246m last year and PEP increased 35% to £542,000.

A spokesperson for BLP told Legal Business: ‘The managing partner election will take place before the end of April 2015 for the next term of office which starts on 1 May 2015. Neville Eisenberg has indicated his intention not to stand for re-election as managing partner but that he will remain at BLP in a different role.’

tom.moore@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Women in law: BLP signs up to 30% female partnership target by 2018

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Gender diversity Berwin Leighton Paisner
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Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP) has become the tenth major law firm in the UK to establish a gender target, committing to ensure that 30% of the partnership by the end of 2018 are female.

The proposal, approved by the BLP board last week, was sponsored by the firm’s diversity and inclusivity group, which is headed by the firm’s head of employment Lisa Mayhew and real estate chief Chris de Pury.

The target set by the firm is in line with Magic Circle firm Linklaters and DWF, with both of those firms having officially signed up to a 30% target for females in partnership by 2018.

Recent research by Legal Business found that 65% of all fee earners at the firm, 492 lawyers in total, were female, yet just 22% of the partnership are women. The firm promoted no female associates to partner in 2012 and just two out of the firm’s nine promotions were female in 2013. This year, five out of the firm’s 11 promotions were female.

As part of the move, BLP will design new training programmes for partners and senior employees, including a new mentoring programme and will explore setting up female-specific development programmes.

The firm’s corporate, litigation, employment and real estate practices are also piloting flexible working initiatives, which includes a work from home scheme which covers one day a week. Every partner at the firm will also go through unconscious bias training, which the firm has hired HR consultancy Pearn Kandola to carry out.

Mayhew, who is also a member of BLP’s board, said: ‘We are passionate about ensuring BLP remains a fulfilling and progressive place to work and this target, and the measures that accompany it, will help create an environment which enables different people to be themselves. This is important to our clients and it is important to us.’

She added: ‘It is a jump from where we are. We know that and we’ve gone into it with our eyes open. The reason why we’ve not been one of the first firms to announce a target is because we had a few discussions at the board and took a long hard look at what we are now and what we wanted to be. We deliberately wanted to set ourselves an ambitious goal. We need to promote significantly more women between now and 2018 to get to a 30% representation. We need to look at the junctions, between associate to senior associate and senior associate to partner, to ensure that female lawyers go for promotions.

The firm recently appointed Claire England as its first dedicated inclusivity manager as it looks to tackle inequalities in sexual orientation and social mobility.

For more analysis of law firms attempts to improve gender diversity see The Target – will tougher measures finally boost gender diversity in the City?

tom.moore@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

BLP scales back Paris office just eight years after opening as local head departs

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France Berwin Leighton Paisner
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Clifford Chance boosts French corporate offering with HSF and Willkie Farr hires

Last month saw much strategic decision-making by Legal Business 100 firms located in Paris, with Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP) scaling back its offering in the French capital and leaving only a liaison outpost following the departure of French head Antoine-Audoin Maggiar, just eight years after opening. Meanwhile, Magic Circle firm Clifford Chance (CC) has made efforts to boost its Paris offering, having hired longstanding Herbert Smith Freehills’ (HSF) securities partner Alex Bafi and Willkie Farr & Gallagher private equity partner Fabrice Cohen.

Legal Business

BLP brings in Magic Circle veteran Bob Charlton to lead on its Asian expansion plans

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Asia Berwin Leighton Paisner
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Berwin Leighton Paisner has parachuted in Bob Charlton to head its Asia group, a role he held at DLA Piper until late last year when a management reshuffle led to his exit.

Charlton will oversee BLP’s three Asian offices – in Singapore, Beijing and Hong Kong – and manage the planned expansion of the firm’s Asia Network from London when he joins in October 2014, before relocating to Hong Kong in January 2015.

BLP’s network launched earlier this year with alliances in Indonesia with Mataram Partners and Legal Network Consultants in Myanmar. The firm also has an ongoing relationship with South East Asian firm DFDL.

Charlton is a veteran of law management and has 30 years of Magic Circle experience under his belt, following a two decade spell at Clifford Chance that ended in 1999, when he switched to Freshfields. He is a finance specialist with a focus on international banking, asset finance and infrastructure projects.

Having arrived at DLA Piper as international head of the firm’s finance and projects group, Charlton was promoted to head of Asia. However, that position was short-lived, with DLA Piper late last year installing a US-led committee to take responsibility for the management of Asia.

tom.moore@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Berwin Leighton Paisner scales back Paris office as French head leaves

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France Berwin Leighton Paisner
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Eight years after opening an office in one of Europe’s biggest legal services market, Berwin Leighton Paisner is set to cut back its Paris offering leaving only a liaison outpost with the exit of its French head, partner Antoine-Audoin Maggiar.

Maggiar arrived at BLP in 2006 to launch the firm’s Paris offering, but the office never became a priority instead it sought to pull in international work rather than French mandates and had a referral strategy in place to pass work to the firm’s larger offices. BLP’s Paris base will now be reduced to a liaison office, with London-based senior partner Harold Paisner, who is registered with the Paris Bar, continuing to work across the Channel.

Corporate finance partner Maggiar is a member of the Paris Bar and a registered foreign lawyer in the UK. Since arriving from Slaughter and May, where he became the Magic Circle firm’s first non-British equity partner, he has helped to spearhead growth of BLP’s international client base and was a member of the firm’s international strategy team. Maggiar is also head of the international committee at French legal body ACE (Association des Avocats Conseils d’Entreprise).

A BLP spokesperson said: ‘BLP has recently completed a review of the corporate finance practice in France. It has been decided the firm should focus on our corporate finance expertise on servicing clients from our offices in London, Moscow and Asia.

‘Antoine-Audoin Maggiar will remain with the firm on a consultancy basis to ensure a smooth handover. Harold Paisner will continue to be a partner in the French office once Antoine leaves.’

The closure leaves BLP with just four European operational offices outside of the UK, in Brussels, Frankfurt, Berlin and Moscow, where firms have been starved of work by international sanctions.

BLP has been hit by a number of senior exits this year, with real estate finance head Laurence Rogers departing for DLA Piper and finance partners Paul Simcock and Ben Larkin leaving for Jones Day.

tom.moore@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Reed Smith and BLP lead on £430m business park buy up

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Property Berwin Leighton PaisnerReed Smith
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Reed Smith and Berwin Leighton Paisner have led on a £430m purchase of three UK business parks by asset management groups Oaktree Capital Management and Patrizia.

Partners Oliver s’Jacob and Graham Reid, who sit within Reed Smith’s real estate private equity and real estate groups respectively, were instructed by the US and German asset managers in their joint venture acquisition of industrial-based business parks in Basingstoke, Cheshire and Glasgow from the UK’s Hermes Real Estate. Chineham Park in Basingstoke is home to the likes of defence giant Cobham and US electronics group Honeywell, while Birchwood Park in Warrington and Hillington Park in Glasgow are home to more than 450 businesses combined.

Hermes was advised by Berwin Leighton Paisner’s commercial real estate partner Samant Narula and corporate finance partner Simon Pollock. For Scottish law advice BLP enlisted support from property partner Gillian Downie of Maclay Murray & Spens, while Reed Smith used a team from Brodies, led by head of property Nick Scott.

For Hermes, one of the largest real estate managers in the UK, registered in Jersey, offshore advice was provided by finance and corporate partner James Hill of Mourant Ozannes, while Carey Olsen’s James Mulholland acted for the purchaser.

Oaktree Capital Management and Patrizia have become repeat clients for Reed Smith, with the firm having advised the parties on their £245m acquisition of IQ Winnersh, an industrial park near Reading, from listed investment trust SEGRO. The latest deal is the third major mandate Reed Smith’s real estate private equity team has signed or closed this month, having advised Marathon Asset Management on its £130m acquisition of 11 former Queens Moat House Hotels and MStar Europe, a £500m joint venture, on its public takeover bid for London Stock Exchange-listed, Tamar European Industrial Fund for £53.55m.

Oliver s’Jacob, partner and head of Reed Smith’s real estate private equity practice, said: ‘This is one of the most anticipated real estate deals of the summer. Following our ongoing work for Patrizia and Oaktree Capital Management, our cross-practice team was able to mobilise a team of over 60 lawyers at short notice to exchange contracts on this significant acquisition within a three week deadline.’

Tom.moore@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Taylor Wessing and BLP advise on £97m Heron Plaza sale as City real estate mandates stack up this summer

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Property Berwin Leighton PaisnerTaylor Wessing
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Taylor Wessing and Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP) have both secured roles on the latest major real estate deal to emerge in the City this summer, advising on property group UOL’s purchase of the Heron Plaza site for £97m.

Sold by property tycoon Gerald Ronson, Heron Plaza will be UOL’s first major development in London and its first foray into Europe. Located off Bishopsgate, the 3,200-square metre site has been prepared for development over a 15-year period with planning consent gained for a 44-storey tower, a 5-star hotel, and residential and retail units.

Taylor Wessing real estate partner Keith Barnett leads a team advising longstanding client Heron International, which includes corporate partner Russell Holden and tax partner Peter Jackson.

BLP chairman Robert MacGregor and real estate partner Deepa Deb are advising UOL, with a team that includes corporate partner Dylan Mackenzie and tax partner Richard Harbot.

On the deal, Deb said: ‘Despite the complexities and tight timeframe, the transaction went incredibly smoothly and we are very much looking forward to continuing to work with UOL on the Heron Plaza project as it is developed.’

UOL general counsel and company secretary Sien Seu Yeong credited BLP for its work on the deal and said the team was ‘highly responsive’ and provided ‘commercially pragmatic legal advice’.

He added: ‘We look forward to continuing to deepen our working relationship with BLP as we make progress on the development of this project’.

Having beaten a number of high-profile bidders for the mandate, Heron Plaza adds to property giant UOL’s already extensive portfolio. With total assets of more than $10bn in Asia and Australia, it currently owns and operates 38 hotels, resorts and serviced units across Asia, Oceania and North America.

In a summer that has seen firms act on a spate of lucrative deals for prime real estate clients in central London, other notable mandates include Baker & McKenzie securing a heavyweight role advising on the receivership of the Gherkin, while Ashurst also advised opposite Reed Smith in July on the £300m purchase of a 50,000 sq ft strip of prime real estate on New Bond Street, the first time in 40 years that the privately-owned properties have been on the market.

Sarah.downey@legalease.co.uk