Taylor Wessing has broken through £500m in global revenue and £1m in UK partner profits for the first time.
The firm posted its 2024-25 financial results today (15 July), with topline turnover of £526.2m (€619m), up 10% from £480.7m last year. The result marks a second consecutive year of accelerating growth, following increases of 9.5% increase in 2023 and 4% in 2022.
UK Managing Partner and global co-chair Shane Gleghorn (pictured) described the result as a ‘great outcome’, adding that it was ‘testament to the hard work of our people, particularly their focus on premium, high-profile transactions, high-stakes disputes and complex regulatory work.’
The UK was a standout performer, with profit per equity partner (PEP) rising 20% to £1.1m, up from an estimated £915,000 last year. Revenue kept pace, increasing 15% to £283.7m from £227.1m.
The results mean that UK revenue has now increased by 80% in the five years since 2020.
Gleghorn said that the firm’s recent UK success is partly down to a sharpened focus on high-value work, describing it as ‘lifting ourself into the upper mid-market.’
He added that this approach also applied to the firm’s private equity practice, which he described as ‘effectively a fifth sector’ for the firm, in addition to its four key international sectors of technology, media and communications; life sciences and healthcare; real estate, infrastructure and energy; and private wealth.
Gleghorn highlighted several practice areas as having had strong years: ‘Our disputes and investigations teams delivered fantastic growth. In the UK in particular, we saw strong double-digit growth in that area. The regulatory piece as well played out very effectively. We also saw strong momentum in our patent litigation practice and were delighted with our corporate team’s performance in a somewhat difficult market.’
Beyond the UK, Gleghorn identified the Benelux region as an area with ‘very strong growth’, adding that the firm had seen growth across all of its European regions.
He also singled out the firm’s Dublin office, opened in September 2021: ‘This was the year Ireland really came online for us. Three years ago it was essentially a startup and it’s now becoming a strong, profitable contributor to our global revenue.’
Posting €619m in revenue takes Taylor Wessing closer to its target of reaching €1bn in revenue by 2028–29.
The firm will need to grow by a further 61.6% over the next four years to meet that goal, something that Gleghorn believes is ‘absolutely attainable’ with the right strategy: ‘We planned on the basis that it would be difficult to achieve through internal promotion alone, so we have anticipated it requires an ambitious strategy of inorganic growth supporting strong organic growth.’
Gleghorn points to team hires such as the 2021 addition of corporate partners Andrew Edge, Chris Cowley and the now-retired Andrew McLean from Stephenson Harwood, along with a 13-lawyer private wealth team from BCLP, as evidence of the firm’s approach to headcount expansion.
With that strategy set to continue, Gleghorn is keen to add to UK headcount. ‘Growth through the hire of teams is very effective and can be better than one-off individual lateral hires,’ he said. ‘In this coming financial year, we will look to do some team hires in the UK.’
In recent years, the firm has set about expanding in Europe. In 2023, the firm announced a partnership with Iberian law firm ECIJA, and in January this year it announced a partnership with Italian firm Orsingher Ortu, a 29-partner firm with offices in Rome and Milan.
Gleghorn said that the firm had no immediate plans to plant further flags: ‘This year, our primary focus is likely to be on consolidating our expansion in our existing locations, including the new alliances in Iberia and Italy, rather than pursuing new geographies.’
He added that Europe was crucial to the firm’s aim of increasing the amount of work the firm does for US companies coming into Europe. Taylor Wessing has two US outposts in New York and San Francisco, which it uses to facilitate access to its European network.
‘We now have the five major European economies covered, which means we’re well positioned to mirror US clients’ expectations’, said Gleghorn. ‘And, of course, Ireland is a particularly important jurisdiction in that context.’
