Of the UK-heritage firms in the running for Law Firm of the Year at the LB Awards, Freshfields stands out as this year’s sole representative from the magic circle.
The firm has been making waves on both sides of the Atlantic, and its recent successes have been recognised with no less than seven other nominations for this year’s awards, from corporate, competition and finance to restructuring, commercial litigation and ESG.
This April it made headlines as one of the largest firms to sign the amicus brief supporting Perkins Coie, which had been targeted by President Donald Trump. That decision to take that stance – led by senior partner Georgia Dawson, who is shortlisted for Management Partner of the Year – set the firm apart from many other international peers who had cut deals with Trump.
Another major development during the year was the move to rebrand and drop Bruckhaus Deringer from its name, while the firm has also poured resources into US expansion, launching in Boston with the hire of Latham & Watkins private capital M&A partner Matthew Goulding on the back of the recruitment of two other senior Latham M&A partners in early 2024.
London M&A partner Kate Cooper described the US M&A team as ‘top of the market’, telling Legal Business: ‘We knew if we could get that transatlantic connection stronger, we could supercharge the growth of the firm.’
And the numbers speak for themselves. While the firm no longer reports its financials in line with other UK law firms, its most recently published results saw revenue up 18% to pass £2bn for the first time, driven in part by 26% growth in the US.
The firm this year handled its first significant US transaction for Merck, advising the pharma giant on the $10bn acquisition of UK biopharma company Verona Pharma, while other major US matters have included advising Google’s parent company Alphabet on its $32bn acquisition of cybersecurity firm Wiz.
But the firm has not lost focus of its home territory and is, according to London managing partner Mark Sansom, ‘doubling down on London’. In the firm’s latest round of partner promotions, the largest share (36%) was in London, and these additions have been supplemented by strategic lateral recruitment, including bringing in ex-Linklaters infrastructure duo Jessamy Gallagher and Stuart Rowson from Paul Hastings.
The firm is positioning itself to take advantage of macroeconomic changes as the ebb of public funds turns into a flow of private capital, and a steady stream of transactional work has driven the firm to seventh place in LSEG’s global M&A rankings for the first half of 2025, after working on 104 deals worth $166.7bn to place seventh, above White & Case, Paul Weiss, Cleary and all of its UK-based peers.
And while many firms are introducing non-equity partner tiers, Freshfields has stuck to its all-equity model as it attempts to retain its identity amid rapid growth – a key reason that Cooper has remained a Freshfield lifer. ‘It’s exciting,’ she says, ‘it feels like you’re at the forefront of something.’
Law Firm of the Year: full shortlist of contenders
Burges Salmon
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton
Freshfields
Latham & Watkins
Osborne Clarke
Russell-Cooke
Simpson Thacher & Bartlett
Taylor Wessing
The LB Awards will take place on 30 September – for more information, see legalbusinessawards.com.
