Clients are being choosy with their counsel in what promises to be a classic year in the courts. Here are the cases to look out for… 1 British Sky Broadcasting (BSkyB) & Ors v Ofcom & Ors BSkyB takes on Ofcom in May as it seeks to overturn a decision to force regulated wholesale supply […]
The Black Solicitors Network’s fifth Diversity League Table (DLT) reveals considerable differences between the larger City firms and their smaller regional and niche counterparts in terms of diversity profiles.
Howes Percival has landed a place on National Lottery operator Camelot’s winners’ advisory panel, alongside a clutch of leading regional firms. The firm’s pitch was led by partner Jane Cowley, who joined the firm in April from rival Harvey Ingram and now heads both the family law and East Midlands private client teams. Other members […]
City firm Speechly Bircham will open its first international office next year, with the most likely location being in the Middle East. The firm has appointed Lesley MacDonagh, former managing partner of Hogan Lovells legacy firm Lovells, as a non-executive member, to help advise on what it describes as an “ambitious growth strategy”. MacDonagh led […]
The fate of the recent Johnson & Johnson contact lens action shows why the pace of movement towards a centralised EU patent system is quickening, says Douglas Campbell Pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson (J&J) has sued Novartis all over Europe for patent infringement over contact lenses, getting different results in different countries. However, the fact that […]
Economic recovery is being held back by unhelpful government actions, typified by recent legislative moves on PPPs. Romania is one of Europe’s stragglers in terms of economic recovery. After a sharp economic decline of 7.7 per cent in 2009, credit ratings agency Fitch announced in December 2010 that it expected the country’s GDP to contract […]
Spanish firm Garrigues pulled the plug on its young Romanian office recently. James Swift finds out why, and if this is a sign of things to come Law firms hate admitting defeat. By nature, lawyers are thorough and risk-averse, meaning the wheels of change are slow to turn. But once a plan has been set […]
Intel European head of labour law Richard Devereux’s formidable remit covers overseeing counsel and employees in 37 countries, meaning an ability to adapt has been crucial to his role. When Richard Devereux, Intel Corporation European labour law counsel, qualified as a lawyer in Ireland 20 years ago he was told by a law professor he […]
Far be it for Tulkinghorn to disparage the general fitness level of the legal profession in this country, but one of his scribes was interested to learn of Appleby partner Gray Smith’s recent ’exertions’. It turns out Smith has a knightly neighbour in the imposing shape of former Olympic rower Sir Matthew Pinsent, a man-mountain […]
What was your first-ever job? Selling vintage clothing on Portobello market. What was your worst experience as a trainee? I had to prepare proceedings for a man whose neighbours were building an extension which encroached on his garden, but the names of the three women who owned the house sounded familiar. They were the wives […]
Covington & Burling has recruited the president and CEO of the American Bankers Association (ABA) Edward Yingling (left) as a partner in its financial institutions group. Move of the week He will advice on regulatory, transactional, enforcement and legislative issues, with a particular focus on the Dodd-Frank Act. Yingling’s career with the ABA spanned 25 […]
2010 saw a slight upturn for corporate teams, especially those whose business is not heavily UK-based, says Gavriel Hollander Corporate partners across the spectrum in the UK have been busily talking up a slow but steady recovery in the M&A market, especially in the second half of 2010. But figures released by Thomson Reuters do […]