Amarchand imports Western talent in effort to strengthen competitive edge

The firm recruited non-Indian-qualified Irish competition lawyer Paku Khan (The Lawyer, 9 November), hired chief operating officer (COO) Valerie Bowles from the UK’s Langleys Solicitors (The Lawyer, 23 November) and has engaged former Linklaters’ India head and Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton partner Nikhil Mehta on a retainer to carry out regular non-Indian law tax work.

The sudden influx of Western talent into Amarchand is pathbreaking, but also somewhat ironic given that the firm is widely perceived as being strongly opposed to foreign lawyers entering India.

Mumbai managing partner Cyril Shroff claims that the firm has been misunderstood on its liberalisation stance for a long time.

“We’re not opponents of liberalisation,” he said. “We’re for it to be done sensibly and in a fair manner, on a comprehensive review of the entire legal sector.”

As observers know, this same review has been ­ongoing for years and is unlikely to conclude any time soon. Clearly the ­strategy at Amarchand and other ­Indian firms has been to buy time, enabling them to grow and modernise so that when foreign firms do enter they will have a much tougher fight on their hands.

Shroff confirms that the changes taking place at Amarchand are aimed at making the firm more competitive, and his brother and Delhi managing partner Shardul Shroff agrees.

“Some of the issues that are now visible have been ongoing for over a year in the processes we’ve put in place in terms of professionalisation both in Delhi and Mumbai,” he explains.

Although Amarchand Delhi’s longstanding COO resigned in July, the office does have non-lawyer managers dealing with finance, human resources, communications, IT and other practice ­support functions.

Amarchand Mumbai’s hire of Bowles, the former COO of several UK regional firms, is then another piece in the puzzle that the Shroffs see as vital for the continued growth of the firm.
Enticing competition lawyer Khan from Ireland’s A&L Goodbody to Delhi and entering into a retainer agreement with Mehta are two other pieces.

“We’re continually looking at exploring areas where there’s domestic expertise,” says Shardul Shroff, “but where there’s not, we’ll look at experts who can step in from abroad.”

He adds that Khan’s hire is an experience-sharing acquisition rather than a practice acquisition, as under the legal restrictions Khan will not be permitted to practice Indian law when moving to Delhi.

Cyril Shroff also hints that hiring UK-qualified lawyers may continue, even if they do not have Indian legal qualifications.

In the finance space, ­particularly in advanced financing and structured finance techniques, he explains, there is no expertise in the Indian market and talent may well have to come from abroad.

Amarchand’s retainer with Mehta has a slightly different dimension and is hoped to enable the firm to easily incorporate international tax advice into in- and out-bound transactions. Mehta will be expected to spend around 30 to 40 per cent of his time on Amarchand-related advice.

But Cyril Shroff says the firm will not be competing with UK firms as it does not refer a huge amount of tax work out and most of that work is handled by the Big Four accountants anyway.
He also insists that calling Amarchand an international law firm is probably an overstatement.

“If it means setting up an office outside of India, we’re not thinking along those lines,” he said.

And seeing as Amarchand has no single best friend but likes many in the UK and US, staying out of London is an obvious choice for the firm.

Kian Ganz is publishing editor of LegallyIndia.com