As the first-ever Global 200 report, published next week, will highlight, while London remains one of the world’s legal market magnets many US firms either choose or are forced to remain small in the City and below the radar.
Talent churn is accelerating among the junior ranks with today’s associates more mobile than the generations before them. The concept of long-term professional loyalty is fading as Gen Z rises. These lawyers ask not what they can do for you, but what your firm can do for them. This generational shift in working attitudes is […]
Hooray, big-ticket M&A is having a mini-revival and so are the firms that make so much of their money out of it. Already in 2024, major European M&A deals to have been announced include International Paper’s £5.8bn planned acquisition of London-listed packaging company DS Smith, which trumped another offer from rival Mondi. Other significant matters […]
On Tuesday last week (9 April), the SRA sought to quell a rising tide of discontent around the Solicitors Qualifying Examination (SQE). In its most recent SQE annual report, SRA chief executive Paul Philip said the public and profession could have “confidence” in this “rigorous assessment”. That confidence was short-lived. Yesterday (15 April), Philip was […]
For one firm, the pan-Nordic dream is dead. For another, it’s just begun. Hannes Snellman’s announcement that its Stockholm and Helsinki offices will be going their separate ways later this year represented the end of a strategic gamble that started 16 years ago. Back then, its leadership bet that opening in Stockholm (2008) and Copenhagen […]
It seems that one of the chief attributes of managing partners is wild optimism. You can’t move for law firm leaders committing their firms to hardcore five-year targets – particularly in the upper mid-tier, where we’re hearing of plans to double or even triple revenues by the end of the decade. We’d like some of […]
Fieldfisher is bolstering its German presence with a sizeable team from local firm SKW Schwartz and a handful of other hires, in an effort to expand its media, technology and IP offerings. The firm has hired eight lawyers from SKW Schwarz including partners Martin Diesbach, Elisabeth Noltenius and Julia Schafdecker, all of whom specialise in […]
Debevoise & Plimpton is hiring from Goodwin Procter as it adds a new partner to its London investment funds team. Shawn D’Aguiar is switching to a new US firm in London eight years after joining Goodwin from King & Wood Mallesons (KWM). He was part of a four-partner team move led by then funds head Michael […]
Barclays lost 44 lawyers in its legal team over 2023, almost four times the average number of leavers across the UK’s top banks. The banks with the second highest number of leavers is tied between HSBC and NatWest, with 12 lawyer exits each, according to indicative data. On the other end of the scale, Royal […]
CMS’s promotion numbers have ebbed slightly in its latest round seeing 10 elevated to the partnership in the UK and a total of 54 globally. In 2023, CMS promoted 65 lawyers to partner globally, with 16 of these in the UK, compared with 40 in mainland Europe. For this year the UK cohort is made […]
Another partner from Milbank’s financial restructuring team is set to leave the firm, this time joining Allen & Overy ahead of its merger with Shearman & Sterling. Karen McMaster is the latest partner loss from Milbank following last month’s news of a structured finance team led by partner John Goldfinch moving to Allen & Overy, soon […]
