Month: September 2013

Posted on

Known unknowns – is the legal industry ready to repel the growing threat of cyberattacks?

Combating cyberattacks on law firms is complicated by the lack of hard information and the shadowy nature of perpetrators. But, reports Legal Business, law firm tech chiefs and security specialists agree the threat is rapidly growing.

What is a law firm if not a huge repository of commercially valuable information? On one side, of course, is the vast bank of specialist legal information held by experienced staff and databases of precedents and legal know-how. Yet valuable as that intellectual property (IP) is – it’s very hard to steal legal expertise.

Continue reading “Known unknowns – is the legal industry ready to repel the growing threat of cyberattacks?”

Posted on

International rescue – the advisers winning the key work for multi-national clients in Ireland

Dublin

Rescuing Ireland’s banks was a portentous decision in the aftermath of the global financial crisis. It has resulted in crippling consequences for the country, with the Irish government having to receive an €85bn bailout from the EU and the International Monetary Fund in November 2010. However, what the move hasn’t changed is the league of established Irish law firms which have diversified core practices and picked up some hefty post-crisis work at home and abroad.

Pockets of the Irish economy are clearly surviving, as evidenced by the restructuring of distressed assets that has generated unprecedented work for the ‘Big Five’ and those catching up behind. Upon visiting Dublin, the overwhelming consensus among the firms that spoke to Legal Business – including the top and mid-tier players – was that firms specialising in corporate restructuring, insolvency and professional indemnity have held strong in this fiercely competitive market. Foreign direct investment (FDI) has also been a pillar for economic and law firm survival, as attractive tax rates and a lowered cost base maintains global interest from major corporates.

Continue reading “International rescue – the advisers winning the key work for multi-national clients in Ireland”

Posted on

LB 100 – The Last Word: Eyes on the storm

From consolidation to price pressure, to market confidence, leading management figures at Legal Business 100 firms give us their views on the 2012/13 year and the challenges ahead

Value for money

‘We’re facing fee pressure of course – and it won’t ease – but there is recognition from clients of different levels of service. The key word is not price but value. Finding a pricing structure which works for the client is essential, as well as supporting the legal departments of clients – helping them to frame key issues to management, helping on staffing shortages, training and knowledge management and so on. These are all areas law firms should embrace.’

Paul Olney, practice partner, Slaughter and May

Continue reading “LB 100 – The Last Word: Eyes on the storm”

Posted on

The lingering enigma of BLP’s bad year

Success is a mysterious beast. Hard to define, built up over years and often the result of a formula even its creators struggle to understand. But failure, well, that’s simple. When a law firm runs into difficulties you can point to bickering partners, problem offices, a weak client-base or an unworkable strategy. Whatever it is, there’s usually a clear narrative to explain the situation.

As such, the current rough patch at Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP) is striking less in itself than because the firm seems surprised by – and unable to entirely explain – the situation. When BLP announced in May that it was consulting on deep redundancies, by many accounts even a number of senior partners at the firm were caught unawares. Continue reading “The lingering enigma of BLP’s bad year”

Posted on

Dissent: Why the in-house triumph over law firms may prove short-lived

Scott Gibson and Kristi Edwards argue that GCs have secured a short-term advantage over their external advisers at the risk of undermining their own position

In the decade prior to the collapse of Lehman Brothers, an excess of work masked the corrosive effect to law firms from competition with increasingly sophisticated and growing in-house legal departments (C&I teams). Post-Lehman, the economic downturn has exposed significant structural challenges to overstaffed law firms, which have been ruthlessly exploited by C&I to decisively shift the balance of power in favour of clients.

Continue reading “Dissent: Why the in-house triumph over law firms may prove short-lived”

Posted on

Life during law: Mark Rawlinson

I was in the first ever gender-mixed year at my college in 1976. I got on very well with one particular girl and she was reading law and I developed an interest. I applied to Freshfields, Linklaters, Allen & Overy, Lovell, White & King and Simmons & Simmons. I got five interviews and five offers in 1982 and chose Freshfields. In those days it was a lot easier to get a job.

Regrets? I would have loved to have gone off and done more mountain climbing, but that would have been very selfish as I had a family. Sport has always been a stress buster – I used to work closely with Anthony Salz, when he was co-senior partner at Freshfields, and I used to drive him mad because I’d hit the gym for an hour right in the middle of a deal, but it really helped to refresh me. But there was a tension between being a sportsman and a serious lawyer. But from early on, I wanted to be the best M&A lawyer. My three boys – Max, Tim and Nicky – are all sportsmen and it drives my wife mad as it is one hell of a competitive place at home.

Continue reading “Life during law: Mark Rawlinson”

Posted on

The Client: Philip Bramwell – BAE Systems

Caroline Hill talks to the plain-speaking general counsel

When BAE Systems’ group general counsel (GC) Philip Bramwell started out as a lawyer in the pharmaceuticals industry, his mother approved on the basis that ‘everybody gets sick’. But as the assertive corporate veteran set out on the deliberate path to change industry every few years, she was less convinced by his switch from BT to O2 in 2001, observing that mobile phones were somewhere between a brick and a car battery and ‘no-one would be so rude as to walk around talking on them’.

Continue reading “The Client: Philip Bramwell – BAE Systems”

Posted on

Private equity: CVC gifts Clifford Chance and Cleary with two major European mandates

Followers of the tussle between UK and US private equity practices for European mandates were last month rewarded with an instruction to both camps by leading buyout house CVC Capital Partners in its acquisitions of Domestic & General (D&G) and Campbell Soup.

Advent International agreed to sell extended warranty provider D&G to CVC in a deal thought to be worth about $1.2bn, according to The New York Times, although this sum has not been officially disclosed.

Clifford Chance (CC) advised CVC, with a team led by Kem Ihenacho, co-head of the firm’s Africa practice and one of its private equity stars. He was assisted by M&A partner Brendan Moylan and insurance partner Hilary Evenett.
Continue reading “Private equity: CVC gifts Clifford Chance and Cleary with two major European mandates”