Month: May 2018

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The Bar Elite: Silk and steel

Helen Davies QC

Despite Brexit, costs pressures and the loss of financial crisis work, reports of the commercial Bar’s decline are overblown. We identify the sets and the silks redefining the modern Bar

Everyone in the global business community seems to know that many of Britain’s brightest lawyers practise at the commercial Bar, helping to maintain London’s position as a world leader in litigation. Over the past decade, nearly 70% of cases in London’s commercial Court have been brought by overseas clients: Russia, Kazakhstan, Switzerland and the US routinely originate the most litigants. Continue reading “The Bar Elite: Silk and steel”

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Sponsored briefing: Opportunistic conduct and good faith – the line that joint venturers may not cross

Hardwicke

Hardwicke’s David Lewis and Emma Hynes assess the duty of good faith in a classic relational contract following the recent case of Sheikh Tahnoon Bin Saeed Bin Shakhboot Al Nehayan v Ioannis Kent AKA John Kent [2018]

A genial sheikh and an overly optimistic hotelier enter a joint venture to develop a chain of luxury hotels and an online travel business. What could possibly go wrong? Other than a global financial meltdown, the Greek debt crisis, a volcano in Iceland, threats of physical violence, blackmail, accusations of swindling, furtive double-dealing, rampant opportunism and – it turns out – breach of a contractual duty of good faith. Continue reading “Sponsored briefing: Opportunistic conduct and good faith – the line that joint venturers may not cross”

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Perspectives: Stephen Parkinson, Kingsley Napley

Stephen Parkinson

I didn’t intend to become a lawyer. I’m the first of my family; we’ve been teachers and priests. My brother got a place at Oxford to study law. I got unexpectedly good A-Levels – I was meant to be going to Thames Polytechnic to read humanities. Sibling rivalry.

Criminal law was one subject I was good at, at uni. Wasn’t good at much! It’s about people’s behaviour – why they do the unfortunate things they do. Gets me out of bed. Continue reading “Perspectives: Stephen Parkinson, Kingsley Napley”

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Perspectives: Clive Zietman, Stewarts

Clive Zietman

I got into law almost by default. I didn’t even like it when I started with Herbert Smith where I was doing non-contentious stuff, but when I did my final seat in litigation I decided this was for me. I’m a games person: I like sport, I like Scrabble, I like fighting. It was only at that point when I decided I wanted to be a lawyer.

It was always going to be litigation. If you look at my profile on our website it says: ‘Clive’s hobby is litigation.’ It’s absolutely true. If I go on holiday and have a bad holiday, I sue the holiday company. Which is, in fact, almost inevitable. We were building a house down in Cornwall and we were entering into a building contract that my wife was helping to draft. I said: ‘Why are you calling in the builders? They’re the defendants!’ Continue reading “Perspectives: Clive Zietman, Stewarts”

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The Silk Round: One fine day

Sophie Lamb QC and Louis Flannery QC

Legal Business writes many high-minded pieces focused on the finer analytical points of the legal industry. This is not one of those pieces.

In an intensively people-driven business like the law, there cannot be many more resonant and personal experiences than becoming a Queen’s Counsel (QC). Firstly, there is the trial of the arduous application process and the agonising wait to find if you have secured the favour of peers and the selection panel. Continue reading “The Silk Round: One fine day”

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The International Arbitration Summit: Trusting the cowboys

Stephen Jagusch QC

I am going to take a narrow view of a narrow subject: less of a keynote speech, more of a keyhole speech. Indeed, it is through a keyhole that I will ask you to join me in a voyeuristic peer into the room of what I call broken arbitrations, the room into which I have stuffed myriad examples of how the process of arbitration can too easily become corrupted.

And ‘keyhole’ is apt, in that privacy and confidentiality – and I hope we understand that they are very different things – prevent the door to arbitration from ever fully opening. It is merely through a keyhole that we form our impressions and understandings of what happens in actual cases. Continue reading “The International Arbitration Summit: Trusting the cowboys”

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Sponsored briefing: Why choose Belgrade as a seat of arbitration?

Mihaj, Ilić & Milanović

Senka Mihaj, Nemanja Ilić and Marko Milanović of Mihaj, Ilić & Milanović explain the advantages of carrying out arbitration proceedings in Serbia

One of the key issues when it comes to drafting an arbitration clause, apart from selecting the applicable rules, is the seat of arbitration. The seat is much more than a technical issue. It determines which legal jurisdiction is the arbitration tied, decides on lex arbitri, and determines which national courts may intervene in the arbitration proceedings and the extent of such intervention. Continue reading “Sponsored briefing: Why choose Belgrade as a seat of arbitration?”

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Sponsored briefing: CRCICA – ‘the granddaddy of arbitration in the region’

The Cairo Regional Centre for International Commercial Arbitration

Ismail Selim and Dalia Hussein of The Cairo Regional Centre for International Commercial Arbitration provide a detailed breakdown of the centre’s work

The Cairo Regional Centre for International Commercial Arbitration (CRCICA) is an independent, non-profit, international organisation established in 1979 under the auspices of the Asian-African Legal Consultative Organization (AALCO). The Headquarters Agreement concluded in 1987 between AALCO and the Egyptian government recognised CRCICA’s status as an international organisation, and accorded the centre and its staff privileges and immunities, insuring its independence. Continue reading “Sponsored briefing: CRCICA – ‘the granddaddy of arbitration in the region’”

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Sponsored briefing: Managing the cost of an arbitration – you may have more options than you think

TheJudge

As third-party funding becomes increasingly mainstream, this article highlights the importance of considering both funding and insurance when looking for a cost-effective way to manage legal spend

There has been a lot of hype about the increased use of third-party funding by companies keen to manage the rising cost of arbitration. Funders are attracted to the arbitration arena by the high-value claims, perceived finality of awards and the enforcement regime provided by the New York Convention. In return, the arbitration community has shown its support by adopting it as a common cost tool encouraged, perhaps, by jurisdictions such as Singapore and Hong Kong lifting their prohibition of its use in arbitrations. Continue reading “Sponsored briefing: Managing the cost of an arbitration – you may have more options than you think”

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Global leaders sponsor profile: KNOETZL

KNOETZL

KNOETZL is a leading Austrian law firm of effective, experienced and perceptive legal minds, providing the highest quality of advocacy in dispute resolution and corporate crisis. KNOETZL finds optimal outcomes for corporate, financial and governmental clients in their most significant and complex disputes. With an all-star team, combined with a diversity of styles and specialisations, the firm represents new standards of excellence in the market.

KNOETZL is Austria’s first large-scale dispute resolution powerhouse dedicated to high-profile and significant cases that matter. The firm is best known for taking the unique approach in Austria to provide a diverse team of highly-skilled lawyers and legal advisers, included from four continents, to offer international, focused advice in dispute resolution. The firm’s dispute resolution specialists have raised the bar to a new, higher level to litigate in Austrian and regional courts, to mediate and to arbitrate across the CEE region and globally. Leading international law firms value work with KNOETZL and the firm is engaged as Austrian disputes counsel by elite international advisers, corporate decision makers and general counsel. Continue reading “Global leaders sponsor profile: KNOETZL”

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UK Litigation Outlook sponsored briefing: Three is a crowd! The rise of third-party funding in international arbitration

Eversheds Sutherland

Eversheds Sutherland assesses the key issues of using third-party funding in international arbitration

The use of third-party funding (TPF) has been a hotly debated topic in the international dispute resolution community for some time, with all signs pointing to its continued growth. The funding market appears to be on a constant expansion trajectory, with the number and geographic diversity of funders increasing, and new funders continuing to enter the market. Continue reading “UK Litigation Outlook sponsored briefing: Three is a crowd! The rise of third-party funding in international arbitration”

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Star power is core to your pitch – accept it

Within the same week, two Magic Circle firms stressed to Legal Business the same mantra after departures of big-name lawyers: it is not about stars, the focus is the platform and that is what top clients are buying. In a mobile market where even the once-untouchable elite City law firms lose marquee names to high-paying rivals, it is an increasingly familiar refrain, albeit one that has spread from mid-weight stalwarts to the tier more used to the role of hunter than prey.

But law firms – and this goes double for the leaders in the UK and US – would be well advised to go nowhere near the seductive institutional defence and not only because the financial results of the last ten years provide ample evidence that contradicts the assertion. Continue reading “Star power is core to your pitch – accept it”

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The wheat from the chaff – Hustling start-ups meet City law

In a quiet east London street off the bustling Brick Lane, a few doors from a sign tagged ‘Vegan Hair Salon’ is a co-working space. You meet Gaz, the office’s bulldog, and work among Star Wars figurines, gaming consoles and an electric drum kit.

It has blackboard walls and is suspiciously empty on a Friday afternoon given the barbecue outside. Equidistant from the corporate hub at Liverpool Street and the ‘scene’ of Shoreditch High Street, music plays. Continue reading “The wheat from the chaff – Hustling start-ups meet City law”

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Iberia: Off the Richter scale

Richter Scale

‘An earthquake’; ‘very shocking’; ‘difficult to understand’; ‘one of the most relevant moves in the market over the last few years’: if you want members of the Spanish legal elite to come up with the most melodramatic expressions they can find, mention Juan Picón and Latham & Watkins.

You can easily see why. The news in November that DLA Piper’s senior partner and global co-chair was joining the US giant as Spain managing partner alongside fellow DLA corporate partners Ignacio Gómez-Sancha and José Antonio Sánchez-Dafos put Spain in the headlines of the global legal press. That does not happen every week. Continue reading “Iberia: Off the Richter scale”

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Middle East: Mission unaccomplished

Riyadh

‘The Middle East. We will try to make it better, but it is a troubled place’: the words of Donald Trump as he announced the recent military strikes targeting Syrian president Bashar Assad’s chemical weapons facilities. Although there is some truth to his sweeping statement, most of the over 400 million citizens in the 17 countries that comprise the Middle East region beg to differ. While the World Bank estimates that GDP growth in the region slowed from 5% in 2016 to 1.8% in 2017 – fuelled by oil production cuts and geopolitical tensions – this is projected to rebound to 3% in 2018 and 3.2% the following year.

The region’s lawyers point to the six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) economies as leading the way, supported by infrastructure investment. ‘It’s a very good time in the region,’ says Doug Peel at White & Case, head of the firm’s Middle East practice, which is spread across five regional offices: Cairo, Riyadh, Doha, Abu Dhabi and Dubai. ‘We are busy all the way around – there’s substantial activity in all the GCC countries and in Egypt.’ Last year White & Case – along with Latham & Watkins – advised JPMorgan, Citi and HSBC on Saudi Arabia’s debut 144A/Reg S Sukuk programme, including the issue of $9bn Sukuk. Continue reading “Middle East: Mission unaccomplished”

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Deal view: Life after Hatchard – does Skadden hunger to take its peerless M&A team to the next level?

Scott Simspon and Michael Hatchard

‘Theirs is the biggest succession issue faced by any firm in the City,’ says one Magic Circle partner of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom’s prospects, following the retirement of veteran dealmaker Michael Hatchard (pictured right) at the end of last year.

The widely-admired Hatchard did much to make Skadden a US trailblazer in public M&A work in Europe. Though leveraged finance hogs the headlines these days, Hatchard and Skadden were still the competitive forces most cited by top M&A partners at London rivals. Having moved from Theodore Goddard in 1994, Hatchard (who remains a consultant to Skadden) was one of the most successful transfers ever in City law. Continue reading “Deal view: Life after Hatchard – does Skadden hunger to take its peerless M&A team to the next level?”

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KPMG: Still not a law firm, still not being taken lightly

Jürg Birri

KPMG’s global head of legal Jürg Birri (pictured) does not know how much it will cost to reach its target of doubling its legal services arm to 3,000 lawyers in the next three years.

He floats $50m and $100m, but for him it is beside the point. It is the appetite he is seeing from KPMG’s member firms – spread across 154 countries and territories – wanting to invest in setting up a legal services arm. Continue reading “KPMG: Still not a law firm, still not being taken lightly”

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Gamification – the thoroughly modern way to redesign legal services

lawyer board game

You may not have heard the term ‘gamification’, but the chances are you have experienced a form of it.

Perhaps you’re an executive in a FTSE 500 company with a generous bonus triggered when your performance meets certain conditions. You could be a corporate client, flicking through the ranked lawyers in The Legal 500, preparing to draw up a shortlist for your next deal. In each case, you would be responding to an element of gameplay dynamics, subtly influencing your judgement, or motivating particular choices. Continue reading “Gamification – the thoroughly modern way to redesign legal services”