12 June 2000
The Lawyer
... as chief counsel joins Weil Gotshal
EBRD is losing its chief counsel to Weil Gotshal & Manges' London office.
... as leading Birmingham partner quits
Edge Ellison's Birmingham office is losing a highly-rated planning partner to Pinsent Curtis.Planning and environmental law specialist Martin Damms is joining Pinsents as an associate.Edge Ellison's head of planning Mark Newcombe says that Damms left on "amicable terms". But it is unclear why he is taking a step down from partner to associate level.He is the second high profile lawyer to leave the firm in the past month. Head of energy Rory ...
A View from Spain
The Spanish legal market, once brimming with family-controlled firms run by well-known legal patriarchs, is undergoing a dramatic transformation. The impetus of this change is the same one that has caused a ripple effect among legal communities in many other western European countries - globalisation of capital and trade. International law firms are waking up to what their clients discovered years ago - that Spain is a magnet for investment.
BA snubs Linklaters for Slaughters
British Airways' has dropped Linklaters in favour of magic circle rival Slaughter and May for its planned merger with KLM Royal Dutch Airline.
Barclays plans global panel as part of review
Barclays Bank is planning to introduce a global legal panel in the next stage of its review.
Barlow Lyde takes RSA work from DAC
Barlow Lyde & Gilbert has swiped Royal & SunAlliance's personal line work from under the nose of Davies Arnold Cooper.
Bryan Cave boosts UK office with Davenport Lyons partner
US firm Bryan Cave is edging its way towards offering a full UK law capability with the recruitment of its second local partner - this time from Davenport Lyons.
Cadwalader's Griffin quits for Herbert Smith
The London office of US firm Cadwalader Wickersham &Taft is losing project finance partner Paul Griffin to Herbert Smith, leaving a question mark over the future of the firm's nascent projects group.
Cahills shuts in Paris as it opens in City
Cahill Gordon & Reindel is transferring its Paris lawyers to local firm Lussan Brouillaud as the US giant finally opens its London office.
Camerons takes in-house team from property client
CMS Cameron McKenna is taking on a property company's in-house legal department and picking up all its commercial real estate work.
Case of the week
Not since the break-up of AT&T in 1982 has a company faced a death sentence, but last week Bill 'why's everybody always picking on me' Gates saw a US federal judge order the execution of Microsoft. As expected, Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson ordered that Microsoft be split in two and imposed sweeping curbs on its business practices. Calling the software giant untrustworthy, the judge ordered Gates to divide his company between an operating systems business (effectively the Windows family ...
Cloisters splits up after crisis meeting
Cloisters is poised to split its civil and criminal teams.
Corporate killing law misses the mark
Mark Tyler believes that the new corporate killing offence has little to do with health and safety.
David Fraser reports on a recent test case which explored what should happen when there is a risk of arbitrator bias
The Court of Appeal has dismissed an appeal from the decision of Justice Longmore in a test case on bias in arbitration. Despite the efforts of AT&T, Clifford Chance, Cravath Swaine & Moore, Sir Sydney Kentridge QC and Toby Landau, in the case of AT&T Corporate & anor v Saudi Cable Company the UK courts have taken the view that the London Court of International Arbitration's ...
Deacons woos Dunhill Madden as Deloittes merger talks crash
Deacon Graham & James is set to merge with Dunhill Madden Butler only weeks after its talks with accountancy giant Deloitte & Touche collapsed.
EBRD threatens to drop its nine-firm legal panel
The European Bank of Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is considering dumping its legal panel - depriving its firms of millions of pounds worth of fees.
Edge Ellison's Leicester operation faces closure
The future of Edge Ellison's Leicester office is hanging in the balance.
Energy
Intense regulation, price cuts and mergers have all had a knock-on effect for lawyers specialising in the energy field.
Enough is enough
Just what is Michael Napier doing?As senior partner at Irwin Mitchell he must surely see that the Law Society is fundamentally flawed, increasingly irrelevant and potentially a problem for the development of a 21st century legal business in London.His decision to stand in the presidential elections - whether a last gasp attempt at reforming the old dinosaur or not - ...
Feddersens anti-trust team sets up own firm
Feddersen Laule Ewerwahn Scherzberg Finkelnburg Clemm's entire anti-trust team is breaking away to set up its own practice.
Financing
Addleshaw Booth & Co advised Barclays Private Equity (BPE) on its £6m investment in online management training provider Academee. BPE will obtain a minority stake in Academee and its parent company Ellis Hayward. Addelshaws corporate finance specialists Jim Tully and Jonathan Robinson led a team of four on the deal. Pannone & Partners acted for Academee.
Financing
Slaughter and May acted for Blue Circle Industries on arranging loan facilities of approximately £1.6bn. The financing was used in part to fund a share buy back scheme in defence of Lafarge's bid for the company. Slaughters commercial partners Richard Slater and Tom Kinnersley acted on the deal with support from commercial assistant Sarah Paterson.
Flotations
Eversheds advised Actinic on its flotation on the TechMark market of the Official List. The placing is expected to raise £25m. Eversheds corporate partners David Stevenson and Jill Lawton led a team of eight on the deal.
Flotations
SJ Berwin acted for Intermedia Film Equities on the flotation of its parent company IM Internationalmedia on the Frankfurt Neuer Markt. The firm also advised on the associated placing to raise euro180m (£113m). SJ Berwin commercial media partner Tim Johnson and corporate finance partners Peter Anderson and Detlef Rüskamp led a team of four on on the deal.
Food and Leisure
At the start of the year, the food and leisure industry emerged fresh from the £1.26bn sale of United Biscuits to an international consortium, the merger of brewer Scottish & Newcastle and the Danone Group, and the marriage of Guinness and Grand Metropolitan.
Fraser Milner moves into Quebec with Byers merger
Leading Canadian firm Fraser Milner is merging with highly-rated Quebec practice Byers Casgrain to form one of the country's top five law firms.
Gleiss Lutz lawyer quits to join Lovells Germany
Gleiss Lutz Hootz Hirsch Rechtsanwälte is losing a tax lawyer to Lovells' Frankfurt office because the firm has failed to find a merger partner.
Heavy Industry
The heavy industry sector is under siege. It is dealing with the knock-on effects of utility restructuring, privatisation and the nation's obsession with new technology. Investors are being drawn away from old, established industries and engineering companies and manufacturers are being pressed to do everything at lower prices.
Herbert Smith gains new corporate head
Herbert Smith is replacing its head of corporate as the firm finally confirms its management restructure.
Investment Banks
Investment banking appears to be the only sector where the in-house legal department does not have almost complete control over the selection of external lawyers. Bankers would rather use their own judgement and personal contacts when it comes to seeking legal advice, making beauty parades largely redundant.
Is your firm ready for a transatlantic merger?
The pursuit of a number of transatlantic law firm combinations has received much publicity recently.
Issues: Insurance
Firms specialising in insurance, specifically claims litigation work, do so at their own risk.
IT and Telecoms
The high-tech world of IT and telecoms is moving so fast that even specialist firms have difficulty keeping up. Like the industry itself, the businesses and legal teams in it are generally young. A new company's growth in this field is often rapid and as a result, its legal team quickly expands to deal with an ever-increasing workload.
It's been a bad week for...
Alan Pritchard. The Birmingham solicitor was jailed for five years after being found guilty of using the legal aid scheme as a "licence to print money", siphoning off £2.25m in 12 months. Pritchard's staff toured deprived areas of the country getting people to sign blank legal aid forms. The judge said that Pritchard, legal consultant Peter Lane and office manager Brian O'Connor had set up a "mass production line" of bogus claims.
It's been a good week for...
Royal College of Art lecturer Philip Shaw, who was cleared by an Old Bailey jury of sexual abuse. The court heard that the woman who accused Shaw was suffering from false memory syndrome after being misled by the US book The Courage to Heal, which claimed "almost all women have been sexually abused". A psychiatrist said false memory syndrome produces "vivid childhood memories that have not occurred".
KLegal tops £6m in start-up salary costs as KPMG wages war on City
After the City's assistant salary hikes, the accountancy giants have been forced to compete. Catrin Griffiths reports
KPMG takes leading E&Y tax lawyer
KPMG is taking one of the top partners from Ernst & Young's new associate Washington DC law firm.
Landwell makes move on Hungary through local link
Landwell, the legal arm of PricewaterhouseCoopers, is attacking the Hungarian market by linking up with local firm Dezso Reti & Antall.
Legal Widow
Bad day on Saturday - I couldn't get into my car at the supermarket. "Listen you," I said to the car, clicking my electronic beep thing in despair. "If your mechanism is going bump - and I can hear it from here - that means you've got to open, you stupid bloody petrol-eating bloody thing!"
MEDIA
Without a doubt the media sector has been hit harder than any other by the dotcom revolution. The recent contradictory US and UK rulings on whether an internet service provider (ISP) is a publisher or message carrier illustrates the need for external advisers to be able to handle the shifting and often inconsistent positions in this area of law.
Michael Ryan
Arnold & Porter's first London telecoms partner Michael Ryan has seen the telecoms sector undergo a major makeover. Tamzin Hindmarch meets the laid-back lawyer who is still shocked by the change
Moving into the mainstream
Public international law can no longer be ignored, with a number of international conventions making their way into domestic courts. Philippe Sands and Maurice Sheridan report on the most influential cases of the past year
Perrin's View
Given the brickbats aimed at the citadels of privilege during the past two weeks, it's probably safe to assume that Oxbridge wishes it had never heard of Laura Spence. And, given that the furore has spawned more column centimetres than a certain sailor in Trafalgar Square, you can but take their point. Here we all were, thinking we were living in the 21st century - all that class war stuff neatly swept under the rug - and look what happens!
PHARMACEUTICALS
The pharmaceuticals sector has experienced a period of unprecedented consolidation which has impacted on the demands it makes of its external legal advisers. In January, SmithKline Beecham and Glaxo Wellcome began to arrange a £114bn merger, just weeks before Pfizer and Warner-Lambert announced their £52.1bn merger.
Property
Hill Dickinson represented Queens Moat House on the £44.5m sale of the Caledonian Hotel, Edinburgh to Stakis, which is part of the Hilton Group. Hill Dickinson corporate partner Felicity Jones led a team of three while Scottish law advice was provided by Drummond Miller. Stakis was represented by SJ Berwin.
Property
Forsters represented Clerical Medical Investment Group on its £46m acquisition of Rolls House and Arnold House in Fetter Lane, London. Clerical Medical Investment Group is a joint venture made up of Clerical Medical and Delancey Estates which hold two thirds and one third respectively of the properties. Forsters property partners Steven Sugar and Sophie Hamilton acted with a team of two on ...
Property
Nabarro Nathanson advised Australian shopping centre developer Westfield Holdings on its £53m acquisition of a 75 per cent interest in Nottingham-based Broadmarsh Shopping Centre. Redevelopment of the centre will be carried out by a joint venture with current owners the Post Office Staff Superannuation Scheme (Possfund) represented by Hermes Property Asset Management. Nabarros corporate finance partner ...
Property
Because the stock performances of many property companies have been badly damaged by the increased trend towards investment in high-tech shares, the purse strings are being tightened. And some of the first to feel the pinch have been the law firms which advise those in the sector.
Public Sector
A boom in the number of private finance initiatives has put plenty of multimillion pound contracts up for grabs. The City firms are winning most of the work, with in-house lawyers saying that they need to be represented by firms which can match those the banks are instructing opposite them.
Quote of the week
"I think when people start to tell lies about a three-year-old child who has lost her father anyone would take action."- Paula Yates after winning her libel action against Mail on Sunday, which printed allegations that she became pregnant to force Michael Hutchence into marrying her.
Radcliffes private client head takes team to Bircham & Co
Radcliffes is attempting to plug a gap in its tax and private client division after the lead partner and four members left to join Bircham & Co.
Retail
The retail sector is under attack from escalating consumer demand for e-commerce. All major supermarkets and clothing outlets are having to head online, and even the largest players are facing up to new rivals, mergers, consolidation and takeovers.
Retail and Foreign Banks
Retail and foreign banking has changed radically over the past decade and with it the nature of its legal work has also changed.
Rio Tinto
This year has been a positive one for Rio Tinto.
Scuffle of the week
Paediatrician Mark Ashton v relatives of David Glass. Ashton told a court in Portsmouth that Glass' two aunts and an uncle attacked him and a colleague after the family asked that doctors withdraw diamorphine being used to ease Glass' pain. Glass, who was born with hydranencephaly, had profound mental and physical disabilities and the medical team believed he was dying of a chest infection. Ashton claimed that he heard one relative tell his colleagues: 'If he dies I am going to break ...
Sector Overview
It is not just the banks that are getting bigger - everything is. During the past few years the business community has witnessed bigger deals and, in simple terms, the establishment of fewer companies.
Slaughters defends Bestfoods takeover
Slaughter and May is preparing to do battle with the European Commission as Unilever finally wins control of US rival Bestfoods.
The bar goes public about human rights
With the forthcoming Human Rights Act practitioners working in the public law sector are gearing up for a boom in business. Emma D'Souza reports on the effects of the act on the bar on how it is preparing for the future
The literary lawyer
Matt Barnard discovers that the man who was the prize in a bidding war between rival chambers, Richard Gordon QC, owes much to his literary skills
Thelen Reid boosts IT with BSC team
New York-based Thelen Reid & Priest is swallowing up Britton Silberman & Cervantez (BSC) to bolster its IT practice.
Top Cravath M&Apartner quits for Chase Manhattan
Top New York firm Cravath Swaine & Moore is losing one of its most senior M&A partners to investment bank Chase Manhattan.
Transport and travel
When it comes to choosing external firms, within this sector no clear guidelines have yet emerged. But globalisation, consolidation and the dotcom effect - which is steering much investment away from the traditional industries - all play an important part in the decision making.
Trouble for the bar's criminal division
The news that Cloisters' criminal team, 14 Tooks Court and Two Garden Court are in tripartite merger negotiations is the latest in a series of major developments to shake the bar.
Watson Farley scoops top A&O lawyer
Shipping specialist Watson Farley & Williams has appointed a new head of European competition.
Weil away the hours
Weil Gotshal & Manges is not planning to increase individual targets to 1,700 billable hours per year ("US firms retaliate in war for London's top lawyers... as they try to match UK billable hours," The Lawyer, 5 June).While we did substantially increase our lawyers' remuneration in March (starting at £50,000 for newly qualified ...
Weil Gotshal forms tie-up with Paris arbitration firm
US firm Weil Gotshal & Manges is teaming up with a four-lawyer French practice in its second European move in as many months.
Winston &Strawn raids Orrick Herrington in NY
Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe is losing 12 lawyers to the New York office of Chicago-based firm Winston & Strawn - leaving a gaping hole in the firm's real estate structured finance practice group.
