Legal Business

‘Doing business the right way’ sees PEP fall significantly at Pinsents as turnover growth slows

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Financial results 2019/20 Pinsent Masons

Profit per equity partner (PEP) endured a 12% drop at Pinsent Masons over the last financial year as the firm continues to hold back funds from partner profits to prioritise internal investment.

PEP now stands at £546,000 at the firm compared to £620,000 last year, when PEP was clipped by 5% as Pinsents held back funds in the region of £6m for the purpose of investment in the business.

Revenues, however, managed to grow a steady 4% to £495.9m, compared to a 7% uptick last year; over five years the firm has grown turnover an impressive 37%.

‘From a financial perspective, I would characterise FY20 as satisfactory given the disruption in a number of our markets,’ commented managing partner John Cleland (pictured). ‘Whether that be Brexit and political turmoil in the UK, protests in Hong Kong, US/China trade wars, US/Iran tensions impacting the Middle East or bushfires in Australia.’

Cleland continued: ‘However, this is already ancient history. The year ahead will present challenges the like of which we have not seen before. Despite obvious headwinds brought about by Covid-19, we’re encouraged by the momentum we’ve found going into the new financial year.’

Earlier this year, the firm promoted staff outside of traditional legal services to partner for the first time in an increased promotions round. Hayley Boxall from Pinsents’ forensic accounting services team and director of client solutions David Halliwell were those occupying non-traditional roles to be given the nod.

Elsewhere, the firm strengthened its New Law credentials in 2019 with a series of moves, including the acquisition of legal services businesses Xenia and Xenion in December. Pinsents also launched its diversity and inclusion consultancy Brook Graham in the Asia-Pacific for the first time.

‘We firmly believe that if we continue to do business in the right way and for the right reasons, our business will come through this year strong, united and better than before,’ Cleland concluded.

thomas.alan@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Pinsents makes up non-lawyers to partner as it mulls quarterly distributions delay in wake of Covid-19

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Partnership promotions Pinsent Masons

Pinsent Masons has promoted staff outside of traditional legal services to partner for the first time in a slightly increased partner promotions round.

The firm said today (30 March) it was promoting 17 to partner, effective 1 May, including Hayley Boxall from its forensic accounting services team and director of client solutions David Halliwell. Pinsents has an forensic accounting team of seven, focusing on disputes, consultancy services and investigations, while Halliwell is charged with working across the firm to help clients change the way they deliver and receive legal services.

The other promotions – up from a total of 15 last year – are across its energy, financial services, infrastructure, real estate and advanced manufacturing and technology sectors. There are just four promotions outside the UK, including Simone Alphonse and Catherine Bendeich in Australia and Karah Howard in Hong Kong in the energy and infrastructure sectors; and David Stoppelmann in Germany. Five were made up in London, with the remainder elsewhere the UK.

Just over 40% were women, bringing the female proportion of the firm’s 474 partners to about 28%. The firm had in 2018 set a target of 30% representation by 2020, at a time when its partnership was just over 25% women.

Senior partner Richard Foley (pictured) commented: ‘Those promoted strengthen our position as a leading sector-focused, multinational legal services provider and mark an important step in our transition to become a professional services business with law at its core. Now, more than ever, developing talent that supports this is critical as our clients grapple with the challenges posed by coronavirus.’

The promotions come, however, as Pinsents warns partners it is assessing withholding upcoming distributions in response to the impact of Covid-19 on the trading of businesses around the world.

Foley commented: ‘Ordinarily around this time of year, we make a quarterly distribution to our partners. Whether we will do so, and if so, in what amount will depend upon how events unfold over the coming days and weeks.’

hamish.mcnicol@legalbusiness.co.uk

 

Pinsent Masons 2020 partner promotions in full:

Dawn Allen (financial services, UK)

Simone Alphonse (energy, infrastructure, Australia)

Catherine Bendeich (energy, infrastructure, Australia)

Hayley Boxall (forensic accounting services, UK)

Matthew Brewer (financial services, London)

Andrew Brydon (advanced manufacturing and technology (AMT), infrastructure, London)

Oliver Crowley (financial services, London)

David Halliwell (client solutions, UK)

Karah Howard (energy, infrastructure, Hong Kong)

Gemma Kaplan (financial services, London)

David Lancaster (AMT, London)

Nick McDonald (energy, real estate, UK)

Ann-Marie Salmacis (real estate, UK)

Michael Smith (real estate, UK)

David Stoppelmann (energy, Germany)

Legal Business

Sponsored briefing: Business as usual in the UK courts

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Dispute resolution Pinsent Masons

Pinsent Masons discusses exciting times for UK patent litigation in 2020 and beyond

For the past four years, Brexit has dominated the legal headlines as well as the popular press. It would be remiss in 2020, the year in which the UK leaves the EU, to fail to acknowledge its significance. However, despite the political and economic uncertainty, we patent lawyers are confident that 2020 will see business as usual in the UK courts.

Legal Business

Pinsents launches flexi-lawyering brand Vario in Germany following New Law acquisitions

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Innovation Pinsent Masons

Pinsent Masons has finalised two alternative legal services acquisitions, enabling the firm to launch its flexible lawyering business Vario in the German market.

The main acquisition for Pinsents is temporary resource provider Xenion Legal, which was founded in 2012 and is based in Frankfurt. The firm has also acquired Xenia, a sister company that operates an associated managed legal services business in Germany.

‘We’ve been looking at Germany for a long time,’ Vario managing director Matthew Kay told Legal Business. ‘It’s become a very important country for the firm with our three offices in Munich, Düsseldorf and Frankfurt. This was an obvious next step for Vario.’

The move sees Pinsents absorb a team of five in Germany, while adding approximately 100 lawyers to its pool of flexible resource. Currently, Vario has almost 800 lawyers on its books globally, with a presence in Australia, Singapore and Hong Kong. Xenion is one of the few flexible resource providers in the German legal market and has handled over 150 placements in the last three years.

The move also comes off the back of some impressive financials at Vario. Last year the business grew revenues by 50% (adding approximately £5m) while the previous three years saw growth of 30-35%. Vario and Pinsent’s diversity consultancy, Brook Graham, contributed approximately £17m to the firm’s £482m global revenue. Kay, meanwhile, has not ruled out further acquisitions as a means to further grow Vario’s global presence.

‘We’re now trying to consolidate and build up our capabilities. But if you look at a map of Pinsent Masons, we will be looking at all the jurisdictions in which we operate. It’s an interesting development because there’s been lots of activity in the legal disruption market, but this shows law firms won’t just be holding back.’

The Vario business in Germany will now be run out of Frankfurt with Kay at the helm. The Xenion and Xenia shareholders, however, will remain within the business.

thomas.alan@legalbusiness.co.uk

Legal Business

Revolving doors: City hires aplenty as Goodwin adds Kirkland PE player and Weil makes restructuring lateral

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Strategic recruitment AshfordsClyde & CoGoodwin ProcterPinsent MasonsTaylor WessingWeil, Gotshal & Manges

Leading US firms have continued to ramp up lateral recruitment in London as Goodwin Procter hired a private equity partner from Kirkland & Ellis and Weil, Gotshal & Manges added to its restructuring bench.

Goodwin hired Kirkland partner Carl Bradshaw to its private equity group. Bradshaw focuses on cross-border private equity deals and has worked on deals including leveraged buyouts, carve-outs, public-to-privates, consortium deals and co-investments.

Goodwin private equity partner Richard Lever told Legal Business: ‘The profile and industry-focus of [Bradshaw’s] client base is entirely consistent with our aim to be the premium mid-market private equity practice in the City operating with clients at the intersection of capital and innovation. We are seeing particular activity in the life sciences, tech – particularly fintech – and business services sectors.’

Meanwhile, Weil added restructuring partner Neil Devaney to its business finance & restructuring practice from Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld. He has experience in cross-border finance, restructuring and insolvency and advises clients on complex, high-value debt restructurings.

Weil managing partner Mike Francies commented: ‘Neil will work closely with our highly regarded team in London and other senior business finance & restructuring leaders around the world to continue to build out our platform in Europe and globally.’

Elsewhere, Taylor Wessing has hired partner Liz Wilson to its tax and incentives practice in London. She joined from Squire Patton Boggs where she was a director. She has experience working on cross-border tax issues within corporate transactions, private equity, commercial agreements, real estate and construction transactions, projects and debt finance.

Taylor Wessing managing director Shane Gleghorn commented: ‘Liz’s appointment enhances our capability, providing more focus for clients and the taxation issues that need to be considered across all of their deals and investments.’

Ashfords has appointed partner Jocelyn Ormond from Simmons & Simmons to its corporate team in its Bristol office. Ormond has experience in advising private equity, venture capital and other funds, public and private companies on mergers & acquisitions, joint ventures, minority investments and equity fundraisings. He will be leading the firm’s focus on healthcare and developing a digital health practice.

Ashfords partner and head of the technology sector and Bristol office Chris Dyson told Legal Business: ‘We see digital health as being an increasingly important focus in the years to come so adding Jocelyn’s specialism to our team puts us in a great position to support this and the wider healthcare market.’

Clyde & Co, meanwhile, hired Janis Meyer, Anthony Davis and Rick Supple from Hinshaw & Culbertson to form part of Clydes’ law firm liability, regulatory and investigations group in New York. Meyer and Davis advise on legal ethics, risk management while Supple is a trial defence lawyer. Clydes launched in New York in 2006 and the latest expansion follows the hiring of a 90-member insurance and litigation team from Sedgwick in December 2017.

Clydes head of the law firm liability, regulatory and investigations group Richard Harrison commented: ‘As law firms have globalised, so too have their legal needs, which is why adding this well respected US team, whom we know well and have worked with for a number of years, is a significant move for us and is part of our strategy of expanding our global advisory and defence capabilities for law firms.’

Finally, Pinsent Masons has hired real estate partner Denis Charles from DLA Piper to its Paris office. The hire follows that of tax and real estate partner Eglantine Lioret and her team who joined the firm’s Paris office in February this year.

Head of real estate at Pinsents, James Crookes, told Legal Business: ‘The appointment of Denis and Elodie is another important step in the growth of our international real estate sector, as we respond to increasing client demand for an integrated, innovative and consistent approach to real estate legal services across a number of key jurisdictions in Europe – one of which is France.’

muna.abdi@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

Legal 500 Data: Behind the story

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The Legal 500 Pinsent Masons

The Legal 500 UK 2020 : Who tops the new rankings?

Pinsent Masons is once again the firm with the most top-tier rankings in the newly released Legal 500 UK Solicitors 2020 guide. The national leader has achieved 69 top-tier rankings across the UK and 163 rankings overall.

Legal Business

Stake in the ground: Pinsents bolsters alternative services with project management division

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Innovation Pinsent Masons

Pinsent Masons has launched a client and legal project management division as it continues to ramp up investment in non-legal services.

The firm said today [8 October] it had launched the division of more than 20 project managers, led by head of client and legal project management Dee Tamlin (pictured). That team has largely been built up since May last year and won mandates in the UK, Europe and South Africa, with the firm now looking to invest further through recruitment in the UK, Asia-Pacific and Middle East.

The project managers work both within the firm and externally with clients, with Pinsents placing project managers into client teams on major projects, litigations and transactions, regardless of whether Pinsents is also delivering legal advice on the matter.

Tamlin told Legal Business the firm first recruited project managers in about 2013, recognising that their lawyers had been providing both legal advice and managing projects simultaneously. The early project managers worked in different practice groups to try improve efficiency, but would now operate from a centralised division which will have its own P&L.

Clients had also been demanding training and support on project management for their own legal matters, she said, a service a number of law firms, consulting and project management organisations had already been offering. Typical mandates so far include disputes work, M&A deals, as well as GDRP projects and regulatory changes.

‘Where we can offer something different is that we’re happy to second our legal project managers into our client’s in-house legal department even if we don’t have the legal work on that particular matter,’ Tamlin commented. ‘In a law firm there’s a whole lot of lawyers, in-house legal teams have a whole lot of lawyers, and both of those organisations are doing legal projects. There’s no reason why the in-house legal team shouldn’t need legal project managers to help deliver their legal projects more efficiently to their business.’

Tamlin added that where other law firms could specify that you needed to be a lawyer to be a legal project manager, Pinsents was open to those without a legal background. The firm was also partnering with the Association for Project Management and other law firms to establish a competency framework for legal project managers so that clients would know what they are buying.

‘We know we’ve got our lawyers and we know they deliver great legal expertise and it’s about making sure that those lawyers are supported professionally on legal project management to really put a stake in the ground,’ she commented. ‘We are a professional services firm, so how can we develop the offerings that are not really the delivery of law and legal matters? How can we enhance that? There is a huge investment by the firm in this.’

Pinsents in July said it had ring-fenced ‘significant funds’ from partner profits in a bid to prioritise investing in the business, in turn cutting profit per equity partner (PEP) by 5%. Revenue at the firm for the 2018/19 financial year rose 7% to £482m and gross profit rose 2.5%, but PEP fell to £620,000 from £653,000 as the firm put aside funds for investment in areas including IT and cybersecurity.

It has been steadily building up complementary services in recent years as it positions itself as a professional services firm with law at its core. That includes contract lawyer business Vario, which grew revenue 50% last year and boasts more than 750 consultants, diversity consultancy Brook Graham, and public policy and forensic accountancy units.

Revenue from the firm’s alternative offerings sits at about £17m.

hamish.mcnicol@legalease.co.uk

Legal Business

The price of everything – Law firm metrics cannot measure broader values that will define their future

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Comment Pinsent Masons

Pinsents senior partner Richard Foley argues the industry needs new benchmarks for success

As Legal Business publishes its LB100, it seems apt to step back and ask ourselves whether the industry is focusing on the right things as it seeks to measure success. It should be uncontroversial to say that if law firms are to work better – for themselves, the wider business community and society – they must be diverse and inclusive of all talents. Measuring that type of success is every bit as important as whether a firm moves up or down a place or two in the financial league table. So, perhaps one measure we should look to in the next year’s LB100 is the progress firms are making in tackling issues of inclusion and diversity?

Legal Business

Revolving doors: Back to school for new City Clydes, Kennedys and Pinsents laterals as European hires continue apace

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Strategic recruitment Clyde & CoKennedysPinsent Masons

City firms have been gearing up for what looks to be a busy September as Clyde & Co, Kennedys and Pinsent Masons have added to their London benches and others continue with European investment drives.

Clyde & Co has appointed Stephen Jurgenson as partner in the firm’s global projects and construction group.

Jurgenson was previously a partner at Winston & Strawn in London and advises on project development and financing, banking and institutional finance, corporate lending and M&A in the utilities, renewable energy, oil and gas, natural resources, real estate and transport sectors.

Clydes partner and member of the global management board Liz Jenkins told Legal Business: ‘We needed to increase our project finance capabilities. We are particularly strong in disputes but we needed a better offering on the front end and Stephen absolutely ticked that box.

‘He will be working alongside our partners and teams in Africa and doing quite a bit of work looking into Latin America as well, which is a very interesting growth area. It’s an exciting time for the team,’ Jenkins added.

Meanwhile Clydes’ head of pensions Mark Howard has left after almost eight years to join workplace pension’s platform Smart Pension as general counsel. Clydes confirmed that partner Terry Saeedi would be taking over as head of the pensions team.

Elsewhere the ever-expansive insurance firm Kennedys has made four partner hires in its professional liability teams across three UK offices, including London partner Paul Castellani from RPC.

In Birmingham, partners Paul Chaplin and Steve Oates joined from DWF. Chaplin was head of professional indemnity at DWF in Birmingham while Oates is also qualified in the Republic of Ireland. Helen Ager has also been hired as head of the professional liability team in Taunton and joins from DAC Beachcroft.

Head of professional liability Jeremy Riley told Legal Business: ‘They all bring new client relationships to us and new specialisms, so it’s grabbing that market share through these hires. What’s been refreshing is that people are knocking on our door as opposed to us approaching people externally.’

Elsewhere in London, Pinsent Masons has hired Fieldfisher’s co-head of life sciences Nicole Jadeja.

Clare Tunstall, head of life sciences at Pinsents, told Legal Business: ‘We were interested in Nicole as somebody who is clearly a preeminent adviser in patent litigation supporting target clients. She’s a likeminded individual with the right skillset, doing really interesting work for exactly the sort of clients we act for.’

Further afield in Paris, Ashurst has hired Allen & Overy counsel Tom Longmuir as partner in its project finance team and Fieldfisher has appointed Emmanuel Paillard from Gowling WLG as partner and head of a new public law team.

Co-head of Ashurst’s global projects Joss Dare told Legal Business: ‘We’re making a consistent push at the moment to grow our international project finance capabilities in strategic locations, and one of those is Paris. We’re looking to capitalise on the opportunities with francophone clients and French banks in particular, who are operating out of Paris into francophone Africa.’

In Frankfurt, Morgan Lewis hired Sabine Konrad to its international disputes team from McDermott Will & Emery.

Konrad told Legal Business: ‘Morgan Lewis has the exact geographical spread that I need for an international arbitration practice, especially with the focus on the Middle East.’

Managing partner in Frankfurt Joerg Siegels told Legal Business: ‘It’s a once in a lifetime chance to find someone like Sabine, with her reputation, recognition, demand and connections into the market. Sabine, from an arbitration perspective, is an excellent fit and addition to the practice.

‘On the other hand it is a new field. It doesn’t mean we give up on our transactional focus. From a strategic point of view, although it’s a new field in terms of practice area, it helps us as a Frankfurt office to connect further with our colleagues all over the world,’ Siegels added.

muna.abdi@legalease.co.uk