Legal Business

Revolving doors: Clifford Chance and RPC bulk out in Asia as Dentons expands in Europe

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Strategic recruitment Clifford ChanceDentonsRPC
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In this week’s round-up of lateral appointments, Clifford Chance (CC) and RPC have added to the benches in Hong Kong, while Dentons has hired in Europe and Lawyers on Demand’s (LOD) Jonathan Brenner has taken on a new part-time role at Keystone Law.

CC has strengthened its corporate practice in Hong Kong with the appointment of partner Frank Yuen from local firm Woo Kwan Lee & Lo.

Yuen, who will join in early 2017, leaves one of Hong Kong’s heavyweight independent law firms, known for its real estate work. CC Asia corporate head Mark Shipman said Yuen had one of the strongest profiles for M&A and equity capital markets in the region and his knowledge would reinforce the firm’s reputation in high-value transactions. Following Yuen’s arrival, CC will have 34 corporate partners in Asia-Pacific.

Also in Hong Kong, RPC has bolstered its own corporate practice with the hire of Jeremy Cunningham from Mayer Brown. The M&A and private equity specialist made partner in 2011 and recently acted for Redwood Investment Company on its all-stock merger with Shang Cayman, to create one of the largest logistics real estate platforms in Asia.

In Europe, Dentons has deepened its real estate bench with the hire of Solera Holdings’ general counsel for Europe, Middle East and Africa David Dixon. Dixon has more than 25 years’ experience advising on real estate transactions and has previously been head of Norton Rose’s corporate finance team in Warsaw.

Dentons’ Europe real estate chair, Pawel Debowski, said: ‘Set against a backdrop of the growing number of cross-border portfolio transactions involving Poland that we’re currently seeing, his experience in leading international deals will certainly be appreciated by our clients.’

Finally, co-founder of Lawyers On Demand (LOD) Brenner has taken on a part-time role driving recruitment at alternative provider Keystone Law. He will remain with LOD spending two days at the contract lawyer service. Brenner launched LOD with former Berwin Leighton Paisner partner Simon Harper in 2007 as part of the firm. It was later announced it would spin off in 2012.

LOD has also promoted its key account manager Rachel Murphy who will take on the role of head of client solutions. The promotion follows Tim Bratton’s resignation following his decision to move to Euromoney Institutional Investor.

victoria.young@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Hacked off: Newspapers launch legal challenge against Mosley press regulator

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Litigation RPC
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Newspapers have threatened to launch a legal challenge against a decision to recognise the first press regulator under the terms of the controversial Royal Charter established following the Leveson Inquiry.

In October a press regulator funded by Max Mosley gained recognition as a state-backed watchdog, even though no national newspapers are among its members.

Dubbed Impress, its ability to operate effectively has come under scrutiny, with the latest being threats to launch a legal action by News Media Association, which has turned to RPC partners Geraldine Elliott and Keith Mathieson.

Elliott wrote to the Press Recognition Panel (PRP) on Monday (31 October) that the Impress scheme of regulation ‘falls short of the recognition criteria in a number of material respects which are not capable of cure…and that there are grounds for judicial review of the decision.’

Writing the letter directly to PRP chair David Wolfe QC, also at Matrix Chambers, Elliott noted the decision was made at a meeting of the body’s board on 25 October, and argued that ‘members, led by you, simply ran through each of the 23 recognition criteria set out in the Royal Charter and formed the view in each case that Impress had been able to meet the criterion threshold.’

‘Other than that, we have no information about the grounds on which the decision was made and what reasoning was applied by the PRP. In particular, without limitation, we do not know on what bases the board determined that each of the criteria was met.’

Subsequently Elliot wrote that her client, the NMA, required ‘urgent sight’ of the material as ‘there is a serious risk of prejudice.’

Elliott requested that the documentation and information be provided by 4 November at the latest, and expects to write to the body with a ‘formal pre-action protocol letter thereafter.’

It is the latest hurdle to the tortuous attempt to bridge the divide between the press and the government’s plans for a regulator. The agreement has generated much controversy, not just the expected outrage among the press – who were quick to claim that it represented a return to state licensing of newspapers – but also among some hardened media lawyers.

The NMA represents national, regional and local news media organisations in the UK.

sarah.downey@legalease.co.uk

For more on the Leveson Inquiry see ‘Shock and Flaw – is Leveson workable?’

Legal Business

Q&A: Julia Chain – RPC Perform’s director on the future of the GC, phone warrants and parties with Richard Branson

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Julia Chain (pictured) talks to Matthew Field on her in-house career, setting up RPC’s general counsel (GC) consulting practice and dealing with Richard Branson.

What do you see as the major changes for today’s GCs?

Over the last ten years the role of general counsel in the UK and Europe become more like that of the US. Now it’s definitely more of a c-suite role. GCs are the third pillar of the profession with barristers and partners in a way. Years ago it was a reactive and not very exciting job. Now it is very serious and well regarded.

The in-house job is a multi-tasking role; you have to be a jack of all trades and you often don’t have a peer group of lawyers in your firm so it can be quite lonely. On top of this is the ongoing mantra of getting ‘more for less’.

What is RPC Perform going to do for GCs?

At RPC Perform, we provide a whole range of services the GC needs apart from legal advice: so strategy, operations, technology consulting, soft skills and leadership development. The team is now in place. We have Jonathan Middleburgh, a dual-qualified barrister and occupational psychologist; Pranav Chopra, a management consultant and qualified accountant; Andrew Dey who was head of legal operations at Barclays and was in charge of legal technology for the bank as well as former RBS legal sourcing manger Varun Srikumar. We now have to bed down and on growing the client base by focusing on what the clients need.

What has the reaction from clients been?

It’s been a solid six months, justifying the proof of concept for us. We have been pretty busy since day one with clients being drawn from both my own contacts and also existing clients of RPC. Recent deals include advising a global logistics company in reorganising its European legal team, helping coach senior leadership in major public utility company and advising a FTSE company on its technology procurement.

How was your move to T-Mobile?

On the day I arrived it was a little company called One 2 One, which was bought by Deutsche Telekom in 1999 and rebranded as T-Mobile in 2002. Early on we did the joint venture with Virgin to create Virgin Mobile. On the Virgin side it was Richard Branson and we used to have meetings in his house in Notting Hill. The whole thing ended in some very expensive litigation but it was an exciting experience.

We set up a call centre in Wiltshire for Virgin Mobile and had a launch party for the operators, mainly young twenty/thirty somethings. Branson walked in to the party and it was like a rock star entering the room. You could see how successful he was because by the end of the evening they would probably have walked across the M25 for him.

As GC at a telecoms company you also had to deal with signing off warrants from the Home Secretary if the police needed to listen in on phone calls. Sometimes you would get a call at midnight for these warrants that came to me personally.

What has it been like coming back into a law firm?

I loved working as a GC and as a consultant. But I started my career at a law firm and I think my heart has always been there. It’s a bit like coming home, it’s a really comfortable environment.

RPC is so innovative – a real 21st century law firm. They took a decision a long time ago that the traditional law firm model is quite prescriptive. We found we fit into the RPC community and we work very well together.

matthew.field@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

RPC loses Sports Direct mandate after embattled retailer bows to shareholder pressure

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RPC has lost its mandate to review Sports Direct’s governance in the fallout from the retailer’s shareholder meeting earlier this month.

Sports Direct said it would run a ‘360-degree’ review of working practices and corporate governance, but the review, which was originally to be led by RPC, will now be led by another independent party.

The LB100 firm was announced as the leader on the 12-month review on 6 September, but now loses the mandate for its long-term client.

RPC had originally led the report into long-term client Sports Direct’s working practices. The report found the retail giant had ‘serious shortcomings’ in its working practices and called for a suspension of the firm’s zero-hours contracts and an end to a ‘six strikes and you are out’ punitive policy.

Sports Direct’s working practices were subject to intense scrutiny following an investigation by the Guardian last December and a subsequent inquiry by MPs.

Shareholders in Sports Direct had called on the company to conduct an independent review at its investor forum.

A statement from Sports Direct said: ‘The board will continue constructive dialogue with the company’s independent shareholders in order to reach agreement regarding the specific nature and timing of the review.

‘RPC will continue to be a valued legal adviser to Sports Direct, and the board would like to thank RPC for its work on the existing working practices report, which was compiled to the highest standards.’

RPC has previously worked with Sports Direct and company founder Mike Ashley, with the firm’s competition practice has advised the board on a number of acquisitions.

IP partner Paul Joseph has worked with Sports Direct on trade mark infringement, while RPC corporate partner Karen Hendy advised on the retailer’s acquisition of stricken high-street chain Republic in 2013.

RPC refused to comment at the time of publication.

matthew.field@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

RPC Consulting targets £50m turnover in plans to challenge Big Four

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RPC‘s insurance management consulting arm is pursuing significant expansion as it bids to hit a £50m turnover target within the next five years.

RPC Consulting managing partner Rory O’Brien (pictured) said the start-up had been boosted by its acquisition of financial modelling tool Tyche last year, which has led to new deals with high-profile insurance clients.

O’Brien told Legal Business: ‘We aim to build the business to produce revenue, a significant proportion of which will be software fees, in the region of £40m to £50m over the next five years.’

The LB100 firm posted turnover of £100.6m, an increase of 7%, in its results for 2015/16.

Legal Business understands RPC Consulting turned over well in excess of £1m in its first 12 months, but has since increased staff numbers and added new clients, including global insurance firmHiscox, which signed up to use its software in May.

Since its launch in February 2015 under the control of O’Brien, former global managing director at Towers Watson, RPC Consulting has grown from a single-partner operation to 45 employees based at the firm’s London headquarters and recently-opened sites in Cambridge and Paris.

O’Brien has a goal to increase headcount to 150 employees in five years, with RPC’s acquisition of actuarial consultancy Marriott Sinclair and its software Tyche in July 2015 giving impetus to the expansion.

‘Analysis that once took a weekend will now take minutes. We’re really confident about demand.’

Tyche tackles some of the main challenges for insurance companies responding to recent EU regulations under Solvency II – a capital requirement test introduced in 2016.

O’Brien said: ‘Tyche means analysis that once took a weekend will now take minutes. We’re really confident about the demand in the market. We have a huge pipeline and we have around 30 ongoing projects.’

In acquiring Marriott Sinclair, RPC Consulting added its three principals, Alun Marriott, Mark Sinclair-McGarvie and Jonathan Broughton, as partners. Now, Tyche is the main revenue stream for the consulting arm.

RPC managing partner Jonathan Watmough added the firm planned to use its software to challenge accountancy firms for actuarial and risk work: ‘We have some ambitious growth plans and we aren’t going to mess around. We really want to challenge the Big Four.’

matthew.field@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

RPC Consulting targets £50m turnover in plans to challenge Big Four

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New software boosts expansion plans for firm’s start-up

RPC’s insurance management consulting arm is pursuing significant expansion as it bids to hit a £50m turnover target within the next five years.

RPC Consulting managing partner Rory O’Brien said the start-up had been boosted by its acquisition of financial modelling tool Tyche last year, which has led to new deals with high-profile insurance clients.

Legal Business

Revolving doors: Shoosmiths appoints five new partners as Burford and RPC make hires

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The front door was spinning at Shoosmiths this week as it swooped for hires from three City firms, while Ashurst‘s exits continued, and Burford Capital and RPC Perform both recruited.

Shoosmiths’ recruitments hot up an otherwise quiet August with a spate of hires from Hogan Lovells, Charles Russell Speechlys, King & Wood Mallesons and a move for Iconix’s senior in-house counsel.

The UK firm hired Hogan Lovells corporate partner Amit Nayyar and senior real estate associate Ed John, who joins the firm as partner. Shoosmiths tapped Charles Russell for planning partner Tim Johnson, and added to the exits at King & Wood Mallesons by recruiting Angus Evers, who will join as the firm’s head of environment.

As well as grabbing a raft of new partners from the City, Shoosmiths added Richard Millington who joins from Iconix, the home of brands including Umbro, where he was VP international counsel. Millington will join Shoosmiths’ technology, media and commercial team in the firm’s Manchester office.

As the firm continues to struggle with a string of exits, Ashurst has lost a key member of its Africa team, with oil & gas and mining project partner Nicolas Bonnefoy leaving the firm to start his own practice. Bonnefoy has advised clients such as Mitsui & Co, oil company OMV Group and Sasol as well as Republic of Equatorial Guinea and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Bonnefoy is the latest in a wave of recent departures, including the firm’s CFO Brian Dunlop earlier this month.

While Burford Capital, the global litigation financing firm, has appointed former Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson head of competition and antitrust Craig Arnott as its new managing director. Arnott takes over after the sudden resignation of Nick Rowles-Davies.

Arnott will focus on the UK, Europe and Asia-Pacific. Burford chief executive Christopher Bogart said: ‘We’re very pleased to welcome Craig to Burford. He brings over 20 years of commercial law experience in multiple legal jurisdictions that will assist us in meeting the increasingly global demands of our clients.’

Finally, RPC’s general counsel consulting arm, RPC Perform, has hired Royal Bank of Scotland consultant Varun Srikumar in the latest addition to the team. RPC Perform was founded early in 2016, headed up by former T-Mobile GC and Huron Consulting legal managing director Julia Chain. Srikumar is the fifth new signing for the fledgling practice.

matthew.field@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Slaughters, Linklaters and RPC win places on RSA’s reduced legal roster

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Slaughter and May, Linklaters and RPC have all won spots on insurance giant RSA Group’s legal roster, following a review which saw the number of panel firms reduced from five to three.

The group legal panel, which was last reviewed in 2011 had also included Allen & Overy, Ashurst and Norton Rose Fulbright.

RPC already sits on the group’s separate UK panel which handles smaller projects and niche insurance work, alongside Pinsent Masons and Hogan Lovells. The firm will continue work across the two panels.

The process was led by managing counsel Jonathan Cope, with assistance from chief legal officer and company secretary Charlotte Heiss, and head of financial crime Peter Townsend. The length of term of the panel, which had a delayed review following a shake-up of the insurer’s senior management team, has not been finalised.

Speaking to Legal Business, Cope (pictured) said that that pitches were limited to two per law firm:

‘We kept it short, the process, the pitches and the documents, we wanted to keep it as short and as focused as possible.

‘One was focused on the law firm more generally, we had a discussion of various issues, focused on the relationship with RSA including non-chargeable benefits, secondees, training, diversity, technology, online portals, what know how and free chats we could have. That provided a good opportunity to meet the key people from each law firm and have an informal discussion about topical issues and understand how RSA can get the benefit of a range of services they can offer.

The second pitch was more technical and was focused on specific areas of expertise we think will be more relevant to RSA in the short to medium term.’

In February this year RSA’s longstanding group general counsel and company secretary Derek Walsh exited the company after six years, with Heiss succeeding him in the new role of chief legal officer and company secretary.

Heiss joined the group executive team and reports to Hester, while group chief risk officer William McDonnell assumed responsibility for the compliance function.

Featured as a rising star in the Legal Business 2014 GC Power List, Linklaters-trained Heiss joined the company as legal counsel in 2010 and was rapidly promoted to the position of head of group legal by September 2011.

In other recent panel news, Standard Life Investments (SLI) added two firms to its real estate panel, with Maples Teesdale and Shepherd & Wedderburn joining CMS Cameron McKenna, Herbert Smith Freehills and Addleshaw Goddard. Meanwhile, a quintet of firms including Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton and Sullivan & Cromwell won places on publishing giant Pearson’s US corporate M&A panel.

kathryn.mccann@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Financials 2015/16: Subdued market sees Watson Farley and RPC post single digit revenue growth

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Financial results 2015/16 RPCWatson Farley and Williams
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LB100 firms Watson Farley & Williams and RPC reported slower revenue growth for 2015/16 with Watson Farley growing revenues by 5% to £131.2m, while RPC’s turnover is up 6% to £100.5m.

Watson Farley & Williams mirrored its half year results and broke the £130m barrier with a further 5% revenue growth from £125.2m to £131.2m. In the first half of the year the firm also reported 5% growth from £56.8m to £59.5m, although for 2014/15 the firm was up 7% on the year prior.

According to Watson Farley co-managing partner Lothar Wegener, the solid growth is a result of significant investments the firm has made in all its business services including technology improvement programmes for IT and infrastructure, knowhow management and offices.

Co-managing partner Chris Lowe added: ‘On a currency adjusted basis we are more than 8% ahead of last year, with our lawyers having advised on a large number of high-profile cross-border transactions and disputes in our core sectors of energy and transport. This is clear evidence that our constant investment into high-profile practices complimentary to our sectors continues to help the firm succeed and differentiate itself in a highly competitive legal market and it is an endorsement for continuing our growth plan.’

Watson Farley welcomed seventeen lateral hires last year, particularly in the firm’s New York office. This month saw litigator Joshua Sohn join as a partner from Mishcon de Reya along with three associates and one paralegal, while Michael Lubin and Jeffrey Rendin join the firm’s real estate group as counsel. Lubin joins Watson Farley from Stroock & Stroock & Lavan where he was a real estate special counsel, while Rendin joins from the office of the New York Attorney General.

Meanwhile, RPC’s revenue was up by 6%, to £100.5m from £94.4m. The core law firm business’s profits rose by 1%, with RPC managing partner Jonathan Watmough calling the result ‘a stellar year’.

While the firm posted 12% revenue growth in 2014/15, Watmough said the 6% increase was a great achievement given the uncertainty surrounding the EU referendum.

The firm, which is known for its work with the insurance industry, has branched out into management consultancy in 2015, targeting its core insurance clients. Last year, RPC hired Rory O’Brien, former global head of risk consulting at Towers Watson to lead the venture.

It added to this business with the launch of a consultancy for in-house lawyers. Dubbed RPC Perform, the consultancy is headed by Julia Chain, the former general counsel of T-Mobile.

RPC promoted three City partners this year bringing the firm to 79 equity partners. The firm also completed a tie-up with Singapore firm Premier Law, expanding its presence in South East Asia to target claims against major banks. This leave the firm with four offices: in London, Bristol, Hong Kong and Singapore.

Other LB100 firms to report this year include Fieldfisher, which saw revenue growth of 7% to bring turnover up to £121.5m. Meanwhile TLT, saw a 15% jump to £71.6m, and Browne Jacobson reported a 9% turnover increase to £64m.

matthew.field@legalease.co.uk

kathryn.mccann@legalease.co.uk

Read more about Watson Farley’s strategy in the Focus feature: ‘This is not ad hoc’: WFW leadership duo aims to drive City specialist ahead of the pack’

Legal Business

Litigation tactics: Solicitor-on-solicitor misconduct complaints up a third in five years

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Misconduct reports against solicitors by fellow legal professionals have jumped a third in five years to more than 2,500 complaints, new figures show.

Complaints made to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) by solicitors, barristers and other professionals were up to 2,516 in 2015 from 1,852 in 2011, according to figures from RPC.

While the number of reports against solicitors was up, overall claims of misconduct remained fairly static over the five years at around 10,900 each year. There were only 123 sanctions upheld by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal in 2015.

RPC legal director Graham Reid said the rise suggested litigation tactics were becoming more aggressive, with legal teams launching complaints against their opposition at the instruction of clients.

Reid told Legal Business: ‘It’s my experience that solicitors, especially litigators, can be over-enthusiastic in making misconduct complaints about the other side’s lawyers. A misconduct complaint is a serious matter: it shouldn’t be used just for the purposes of litigation tactics.’

In major litigation claims Reid said that clients may bring complaints against minor problems, such as the use of delaying tactics or factual errors during evidence, which do not result in a full incident of misconduct.

He added: ‘A solicitor thinking of making a misconduct complaint should be aware of the risk of wasting the regulator’s time,’ said Reid. ‘The SRA does not have inexhaustible resources, and it may not like being used for the purposes of point-scoring in litigation.

‘Being on the receiving end of a misconduct allegation – even where it doesn’t have a grain of truth to it – can be very upsetting for the solicitor concerned, it can undermine client trust and create potential self-interest conflicts.’

matthew.field@legalease.co.uk