The AIM of the game

=1 Hammonds
Key personnel: Martin Thomas
Key nomad contacts: Collins Stewart, KBC Peel Hunt, Evolution Beeson Gregory, Seymour Pierce
With a practice that is well balanced between corporates and nominated advisers (nomads), Hammonds is easily the best-performing law firm this year; and all this despite losing key partner Robert Hamill to Mayer Brown Rowe & Maw. Given the firm's stellar performance in the last survey, this is all the more impressive. In the 2001 survey, the firm completed 19 floats, just one more than it managed in 2002-03, a much tougher market. The firm worked for a wide range of nomads, and some of the floats it was involved in were high value, particularly the CustomVis and Park Row Group work, where Hammonds acted for the companies.

=1 Memery Crystal
Key personnel: Lesley Gregory, Greg Scott, Andrew Titmuss
Key nomad contacts: Collins Stewart, Seymour Pierce
Although Memery Crystal is joint first in terms of number of floats done, it has not been a vintage couple of years for the AIM specialist. It did almost half the number of floats in 2002-03 (18) than it handled in The Lawyer's 2001 survey (32), and its overreliance on Seymour Pierce has been exposed. Of the firm's floats, 15 were for nomads, with just three for companies, and given that The Lawyer survey has found that brokers are cutting legal costs, the firm no doubt had a tough time financially. On the plus side, the firm is trying to broaden its contacts outside the traditional Seymour Pierce base and it did get one float apiece for City Financial, Collins Stewart, Daniel Stewart & Co and Noble & Co. There have also been marketing tours to Canada to cash in on the flood of foreign natural resources companies listing on AIM. On the downside, the firm was criticised by its competitors for low billing more often than any other firm. Scott refused to comment on any issue relating to the fees charged by Memery Crystal.

3 Berwin Leighton Paisner
Key personnel: David Collins
Key nomad contacts: Brewin Dolphin, Canaccord
Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP) was a strong performer in the survey. The firm hauled in a whopping nine AIM floats for issuers and an additional three for nomads. The highlight was probably last month's Monsoon float. As was obvious from the 2001 AIM survey, the practice is focused heavily on corporates. However, nomad work is generally less remunerative and the City firm's fee structure probably could not handle a bulk nomad practice. It is also notable that BLP's floats were generally for companies with low market caps, three of them being valued at under £1.5m. However, the firm's good mid-tier corporate client base serves it well and BLP is now firmly established as one of the major players on the AIM scene.

4 Addleshaw Goddard
Key personnel: Simon Griffiths, Ian Macintosh, John Hiscock
Key nomad contacts: Brewin Dolphin, Close Brothers, KBC Peel Hunt, Williams de Broe
Addleshaw Goddard's two legacy firms, Addleshaw Booth & Co and Theodore Goddard, have performed well in the survey, although it is too early to say definitively how the merged firm will fare in the future. The two firms between them have racked up 10 deals in the 2002-03 period, compared with a combined total of 16 in the last survey. The bulk of the deals came from the Addleshaws side, with Simon Griffiths' legacy Theodore Goddard London practice relatively quiet. However, the fit between the two firms looks promising and there are big plans to cross-sell broker contacts to London.

5 Norton Rose
Key personnel: Richard Sheen
Key nomad contacts: Charles Stanley, Collins Stewart
The firm closed a respectable nine AIM floats in 2002-03, down from 14 in The Lawyer's last survey, and most of these were in the range of £10m-£15m. The AIM practice is run out of the firm's corporate finance department, and partner Richard Sheen attributes the firm's success to its relationships with key brokers, chiefly Collins Stewart and Charles Stanley. Indeed, this year six of the firm's nine deals were for nomads. According to Sheen, nomads also refer the bulk of the firm's issuer clients. In July, the firm celebrated a coup when it advised on the year's first media company IPO, acting for Collins Stewart on the float of Milestone Group. Sheen says that, although rewarding, AIM work can also test the patience of any corporate lawyer, since "you're often dealing face-to-face with management, and not with in-house counsel. It can be more work - sometimes I can get 80 emails a day, most of which don't make sense."

=6 Halliwell Landau
Key personnel: Mark Halliwell
Key nomad contacts: Altium Capital, Brewin Dolphin
In the 2001 survey, work for issuers accounted for two-thirds of Halliwell Landau's AIM practice. By contrast, in 2002-03, the firm advised on eight floats, achieving an equal balance between issuer and nomad clients. Although AIM partner Mark Halliwell says of the firm "we're a young outfit and we focus on advising the entrepreneur", it is strong ties to key nomad clients Altium Capital and Brewin Dolphin that has kept the group busy in the last 18 months. Halliwell credits the "diabolical" slump in new issues to the shift in focus. The firm's most successful float was the £8m float of Cardpoint. The cashpoint installation company came to the firm through partner connections and proved to be the ideal AIM client, having undertaken several acquisitions following its AIM listing. Halliwell says: "They're the dream AIM client. They floated for the right reasons, used the market to raise capital and managed to maintain interest in their stock."

=6 Lawrence Graham
Key personnel: Hugh Maule
Key nomad contacts: Charles Stanley, Collins Stewart, Seymour Pierce, Teather & Greenwood
In the 2001 survey, Lawrence Graham advised on just five AIM floats. This year, however, it bucked market trends and closed a respectable eight AIM deals. Last year the firm acted for the issuer on all but one of its AIM floats, but has worked hard at expanding its list of nomad clients. The efforts have paid dividends, and while AIM partner Hugh Maule still describes his client base as "typically entrepreneurial", work for nomads accounted for half of the group's instructions. Notably, it advised Collins Stewart as nomad on the £50m flotation of EPIC Brand Investments.

8 Taylor Wessing
Key personnel: Tim Stocks
Key nomad contacts: Brewin Dolphin, Collins Stewart, Evolution Beeson Gregory
Despite the downturn in the market and a disappointing past year for the firm, the AIM group has enjoyed a reasonable 18 months, advising on seven floats. It has a largely corporate client base and advised the broker on just one of the seven floats. It acted for Lornamead as co-investor on the admission to AIM of EPIC Brand Investments, and advised Chicago Climate Exchange on its £15m IPO. Reflecting a trend among companies dwelling in the 'twilight zone' of the main market, Taylor Wessing has advised two clients - Touchstone and Quadrant - moving down from the full list to AIM.

9 Wragge & Co
Key personnel: Keith Spedding, Ed Dawes, Julian Henwood
Key nomad contacts: Grant Thornton, Peel Hunt, WH Ireland
The Wragge & Co group managed six AIM floats in the 2001-02 survey, but this year advised on just one float and one transfer from the official list. Both transactions were under £6m in value, and in both cases the firm advised the issuer. AIM partner Keith Spedding was philosophical about the decline, explaining: "There's not a whole lot of work, but in the current market conditions it's to be expected. The cake has got smaller and we've got a smaller slice." Wragges is unusual for its size in that it has a dedicated AIM team, headed up by Spedding and Ed Dawes. The team acknowledges its need to build a stable nomad practice and is homing in on six key nomads in Birmingham and London, although as Spedding says: "We'd work with anyone really." In particular, Spedding and his team are targeting Peel Hunt, Brown Shipman, WH Ireland, Grant Thornton, Williams de Broe and Evolution Beeson Gregory.

=10 Ashurst Morris Crisp
Key personnel: Michael Robbins
Key nomad contacts: Brown Shipley & Co, Evolution Beeson Gregory, Investec
Despite the market slump, Ashurst Morris Crisp has reinforced its position in AIM. This year, the firm advised on five AIM deals, down from eight in the previous survey, but a respectable showing in this market. The firm still leans towards advising nomad clients, but its major deal was advising the issuer on the £35.4m float of pharmaceutical company NeuTec Pharma.

=10 Osborne Clarke
Key personnel: Adrian Bott, Simon Fielder
Key nomad contacts: Evolution Beeson Gregory
The firm acted on just four AIM floats in 2002-03, down from five in 2001. The most notable are the £34m admission of Regal Petroleum and the £30m float of waste management company Compact Power Holdings. Secondary issues, however, have kept the practice ticking over, and strong ties with Evolution Beeson Gregory have ensured Osborne Clarke's place on issues for Inter-Alliance Group, Sterling Energy and Cardpoint.

=12 Eversheds
Key personnel: Neil Matthews
Key nomad contacts: Charles Stanley, Collins Stewart, Evolution Beeson Gregory, Peel Hunt, Teather & Greenwood
From 14 floats in 2001, the firm has slumped to close just four AIM deals in the past 18 months. Three of these were for issuers. However, AIM partner Neil Matthews says the group has maintained its links with small to medium-cap brokers.

=12 Howard Kennedy
Key personnel: Keith Lassman
Key nomad contacts: ARM Corporate Finance, Beaumont Cornish, Evolution Beeson Gregory
Howard Kennedy advised on four floats in the 2002-03 survey, down from five in 2001. The largest of these was the £9m float of Prezzo, on which the firm advised the issuer. Clients of the group are a combination of serial entrepreneurs and nomads. Indeed, AIM partner Keith Lassman says the firm's issuer clients are now largely referred by nomads.

=12 Mayer Brown Rowe & Maw
Key Personnel: Stephanie Bates, Robert Hamill
Key nomad contacts: Collins Stewart, KBC Peel Hunt, Rothschilds
Mayer Brown Rowe & Maw is included in The Lawyer's AIM survey for the first time this year. The Anglo-US firm did three floats for companies and one for a nomad, bringing it a well-earned place in the 2002-03 survey. It floated Centurion Energy this June, one of the biggest AIM deals of the year, and just this week completed the float of Chepstow Racecourse for Northern Racing, a company with a market cap of £60m. The firm's profile has shot up partly thanks to the recruitment this February of Robert Hammil, who was previously the head of private equity at Hammonds. Hammil brought with him excellent broker contacts, particularly with KBC Peel Hunt and Teather & Greenwood. This firm is one to watch next year as the market picks up.

=12 Nabarro Nathanson
Key personnel: Iain Newman
Key nomad contacts: Collins Stewart, KBC Peel Hunt
In the 2001 AIM survey, Nabarro Nathanson managed 13 floats, but did just four this time round. The work was split 50-50 between corporates and nomads, with Nabarros handling floats for Collins Stewart, one of the most prolific brokers in our survey. However, neither of the two issuer floats were particularly large or notable. The market for technology issues only really stirred last month with plans for an IPO of search engine Google. Only if interest in tech stocks really picks up is Nabarros, with its traditionally tech-focused practice, likely to become a force again on AIM.

=12 Nicholson Graham & Jones
Key personnel: Kevin McGuiness, Richard Herbert
Key nomad contacts: Corporate Synergy, KBC Peel Hunt, WH Ireland
In the 2001 survey, Nicholson Graham & Jones racked up five deals in 12 months. For 2002-03, the firm closed just four deals, but given the market that is not at all bad. In fact the firm now has far more lawyers doing AIM work than when the last survey was compiled - three other partners now help McGuiness out. Crucially, Nicholson Graham decided to move into nomad work recently and has been retained by WH Ireland, a broker which is itself trying to break the City. The firm's broad corporate client base continues to feed the vital and considerably more lucrative issuer side.

=12 Pinsents
Key personnel: Gareth Edwards
Key nomad contacts: Brewin Dolphin, Evolution Beeson Gregory
The market has taken its toll on Pinsents over the past 18 months. While the firm's AIM group completed 11 floats in 2001, in this year's survey it only managed four, mostly for the issuer. Longstanding issuer clients have also been quiet, and this year the firm advised on just a handful of secondary listings. But according to AIM partner Gareth Edwards, Pinsents will continue to nurture "active, entrepreneurial companies". "The IPO is the entry point and you hope to build a lasting relationship from there on," he adds. The firm's sole nomad deal was advising Evolution Beeson Gregory on the transfer of Osmotech from the official list to AIM, but Edwards hopes to grow the firm's still zygotic relationships with nomad clients such as Brewin Dolphin and Evolution Beeson Gregory.

18 Jones Day Gouldens
Key personnel: Hilary Winter, John Pillips
Key nomad contacts: Charles Stanley, Investec, Teather & Greenwood
A poor 18 months for Jones Day Gouldens, during which it advised on just two AIM floats. Both were under £10m in value and on both occasions the firm advised the issuer.

19 DLA
Key personnel: Mark Taylor, Charles Severs, Alex Tamlin
Key nomad contacts: Evolution Beeson Gregory, Nabarro Wells, Collins Stewart, Investec
What a difference a year makes. In the 2001 survey, DLA advised on 12 AIM deals in 12 months, while for 2002-03, it acted on just one. Sure, the Excel Airways float, with a market cap of £150m, was among the larger AIM floats, but it is clear that the firm's AIM practice has suffered in the downturn. AIM partner Alex Tamlin told The Lawyer that the firm has reallocated resources from AIM work to M&A and private equity. "We've developed the sort of private equity practice that SJ Berwin has," he said. "That's enabled us to allocate people away from corporate finance." It is hoped that extra bodies in the financial regulatory department will pay dividends when the market improves and more of the group's clients look to go public.