Tomorrow the appeal of the TwitterJokeTrial case will be heard at the High Court. English law moves slowly. It is well over a year since Doncaster Crown Courtupheld the original conviction of Paul Chambers for an offence under section 127(1) of the Communications Act 2003. And it is over two years since the originaljokey but […]
Firm has made the most of its close association with London 2012 Pretty much every event that Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer puts on these days has an Olympic theme, so it is no surprise that the firm will have a different feel when this year’s Olympics are over. A small number of staff have been brought […]
Return of Jason Fry re-establishes magic circle firm’s arbitration credentials The revolving door between the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) International Court of Arbitration and Clifford Chance spun a little faster last week as the magic circle firm rehired the court’s secretary general as a partner. Jason Fry, who took up the ICC role in […]
US firm Weil Gotshal & Manges has added Hogan Lovells partner Mark Donald to its London finance practice. Weil London head Mike Francies said the hire was evidence of the firm’s growing reputation in the market. “Coupled with the associate team we’re building, [it] shows the depth of our commitment to the London finance practice,” […]
All-equity, a hugely consistent growth strategy and plenty of female partners Bristows, one of the UK’s last remaining all-equity, pure lockstep partnerships, is distinguished by its impressive consistency in recent years. Much of the firm’s success can be attributed to its reputation for handling contentious and non-contentious IP work. In 2007-08 the firm scooped three […]
BPE Solicitors HR director Julia Jones is also head of the Cheltenham firm’s in-house HR consultancy, which operates alongside the legal teams. Jones is a chartered fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development and has more than 15 years’ experience delivering commercial HR advice. She is also an Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service-accredited […]
What was your first-ever job? Working on a fruit and nut stall in Warrington market. What was your worst experience as a trainee? Assisting with a video deposition in a dark room on a lovely spring Friday night, which ran on until after midnight (and which also happened to be my birthday). If you weren’t […]
As the competition hots up in the City to secure training contracts and associate roles, it is worth looking at what some of the smaller firms in the West End have to offer. As the competition hots up in the City to secure training contracts and associate roles, it is worth looking at what some […]
The downturn gets blamed for everything One good thing about the dire economic situation is that it bestows a Teflon-coated excuse for just about anything that goes wrong – much like a pet or an elderly relative – and law firms have not been slow to blame bad news on faltering markets. CMS Cameron McKenna […]
The decision by five Bristol-based barristers to leave their practices at Queen Square Chambers for local rival Guildhall Chambers comes as the regional bar enters a period of unprecedented change. Employment barristers Debbie Grennan, Julian Allsop, Douglas Leach and Allan Roberts will all join the new team, with 21 year-call barrister Nick Smith at the […]
Howard Kennedy partners knew they were in for a cultural overhaul when they appointed the firm’s first non-lawyer chief executive Mark Dembovsky. They never dared to dream that he would reward them for this with anything other than old-fashioned cash. Yet that is precisely what he did. When the firm converted to an LLP the […]
The Chinese renminbi is vying for mainstream status In the past two decades China’s economy has grown on average by 9.8 per cent per year in real terms, overtaking Japan as the world’s second-largest economy. A natural trend for its currency, the renminbi (Rmb), is to become more widely used for trade and investment. Around […]