More than 30 partners have left the firm in the last 18 months
Having emerged as one of the worst performers in the Legal Business 100 last month and strongly touted to be in the market for a merger, September saw further departures from Olswang, adding to a steady stream of exits in recent months.
The latest exits from the troubled tech player are co-head of life sciences and intellectual property partner Stephen Reese departing the firm in favour of Clifford Chance, the firm’s Spanish managing partner, Pablo Bieger Morales, who left for Broseta Abogados, and in Paris, experienced corporate partner Christophe Gaschin joined Groupe Bertrand as general counsel.
These latest departures add to those of Brussels partner Sylvie Rousseau, a former head of TMT for Linklaters in Paris, who quit the firm to become a consultant in July. Reading real estate partner Carol Phillips left the practice earlier this year to become head of real estate at Virgin Media.
This year alone, the firm has lost a number of its City partners, including Barry Stimpson who moved to Bond Dickinson, the former head of the firm’s data protection practice Ross McKean to DLA Piper, London competition head Howard Cartlidge to DWF, corporate partner Duncan McDonald to Taylor Wessing and former head of Olswang’s international telecoms practice Purvi Parekh, who is understood to be moving into an in-house role. In March, the office also lost the founder of its finance group Moni Mannings, who chose to retire and focus on her growing non-executive career.
These exits mean Olswang has seen more than 30 lawyers leave the partnership in the past 18 months, which in 2015/16 had 101 partners. This figure includes 14 partners who defected from Olswang to Greenberg Traurig in Berlin last summer. Although at Christmas last year a number of partners were understood to have been asked to leave the firm as part of a strategic review, which one former partner said affected up to 12 individuals, not all the departures were planned.
‘We hear of partners being kept completely in the dark by the leadership team.’
‘Reports from within suggest that morale between partners and staff is at rock bottom,’ said the former partner. ‘Further, we hear of partners being kept completely in the dark by the leadership team, which is ironic given it was one of the major complaints levied against the previous management team.’
Another ex-partner added that rumours of Olswang actively seeking a white knight have intensified.
‘From what I hear, it is not a matter of if it will be a merger, it’s just when. The firm has to merge soon if that is the strategy, otherwise it will have real problems.’
Repeated requests for an interview with Olswang’s senior management have been ignored. A spokesperson said the points put to the firm contained ‘factual inaccuracies’ but refused to comment on specifics.