Herbert Smith has appointed 41 partners in three years, of whom 31 were internal promotions and 10 were laterals. Of the 31 internal appointments, only three were women.

Corporate in London does particularly well: in 2005-06 the four London promotions accounted for all corporate appointments that year. No other sector comes close to equalling that throughout the three-year period. Notably, litigation in London has not kept pace with corporate. In 2003- 04, two London litigators were promoted and in 2004-05 just one. But in 2005 not one London litigator made it into the partnership; the only litigator to get through was based in Tokyo.

IP/IT, meanwhile, has seen no partnership appointments since 2003- 04, when there was one internal in London and one lateral in Paris. Real estate has a good track record of promotions, with a minimum of one internal a year for the past four years. In total, real estate has made five internal promotions in three years – a total just short of the litigation group’s six promotions in that time. The number of new finance partners has risen in the past three years, which is consistent with the firm’s strategy of building the sector. These figures do not include two banking partners from Denton Wilde Sapte, who are due to join Herbert Smith in the near future.