Posted on

Land Securities

  • Group general counsel and company secretary: Adrian de Souza.
  • Team headcount: eight lawyers.

Due to the nature of the industry, in-house real estate teams are traditionally smaller than most, tending to gift significant mandates to their chosen counsel. Group GC Adrian de Souza and his high functioning team at FTSE 100 company Land Securities outsource about 99% of their legal work, typically spending in the region of £15m-£20m externally.

‘The team here know their roles really well,’ comments de Souza. ‘They don’t do external lawyers’ work and they don’t do the business person’s work, but they
act as a seamless conjugate between the two. Every single sale for Land Securities has a bespoke legal agreement attached to it. Legal is right at the heart of our business and a relatively small legal team makes sure the work is done on a consistent and high-quality basis.’

One way in which the team ensures high-quality output is treating external lawyers as an extension of the in-house team, bringing them into the business and familiarising them with its specific model. Alongside this, the team also has an unusual market-shaping programme of identifying and supporting the rising stars in real estate practices across its law firms, safeguarding against a possible shortage of star lawyers in the years to come.

Like many in-house teams, the legal department at Land Securities does not think much of hourly rates, instead taking direct responsibly for driving the efficiency of its panel firms. Head of legal Alex Peeke, says: ‘Conventionally in real estate you are budgeting as a percentage of the transaction amount.’

The team’s highlights over the last year include the acquisition of a controlling stake in the Bluewater shopping centre in Kent – bought from Lend Lease Corporation for just under £700m, as well as the £1bn development of the iconic Walkie Talkie building, together with the Canary Wharf Group, which was 90% let at completion when it opened towards the end of 2014. But the team is arguably at its most effective around Victoria, where Land Securities is currently putting up around £2bn worth of buildings. It also has planning permission for a new residential tower worth over £1bn – the conversion of an office block, which is the tallest building in the area.

Continue reading “Land Securities”

Posted on

Jenny Lowe: Senior legal counsel, property and planning, Aggregate Industries

In January 2012, with five years’ post-qualification experience, Jenny Lowe joined Aggregate Industries from McGrigors, taking on the role of senior counsel for property and planning. Lowe took responsibility for a large property portfolio and managing all property-related transactions, including sales and acquisitions, estate management, litigation, minerals issues, planning, renewable energy and regulatory.

Since joining Aggregate Industries, Lowe has sharply reduced legal spend on property-related matters.

One real estate partner at a top five UK law firm says: ‘The industry that Jenny works within is very male-dominated but she is more than able to enlist the support and respect of her internal clients, which is an absolute must for success. I can recommend Jenny without exception.’

Continue reading “Jenny Lowe: Senior legal counsel, property and planning, Aggregate Industries”

Posted on

Sarah Doherty: Legal counsel, Coca-Cola

Sarah Doherty only completed her training contract at Coca-Cola in February 2012, having previously been a paralegal, but she has been quickly promoted to become the lead lawyer supporting Coca-Cola’s Great Britain and Ireland franchise operations team in London and Dublin.

Doherty’s area of responsibility includes negotiating high-value sponsorship agreements, such as the London Olympics 2012, FIFA World Cup 2014 and sponsorship of the London Eye. Doherty also deals with significant brand and product launches, including the launch in 2014 of SmartWater and Coca-Cola Life.

An intellectual property partner at one top 15 UK law firm comments: ‘Sarah isolates and deals with strategic issues with great skill and does so with a degree of sophistication that belies her experience. In order to handle the sheer volume of tasks she undertakes, she is extremely efficient but always great to work with. A real star.’

Doherty cites her biggest achievements as ‘playing a key role on major Coca-Cola sponsorships and activities such as the London Olympics in 2012, the extremely successful “Share a Coke” campaign and co-branding programmes for Diet Coke with international designers’.

Continue reading “Sarah Doherty: Legal counsel, Coca-Cola”

Posted on

Sarah Morton: Managing counsel, global litigation, Europe, Middle East and North Africa, Shell

Having joined Shell in November 2011 from Debevoise & Plimpton, where she worked with former general counsel (GC) Peter Rees QC, Sarah Morton built the oil giant’s dedicated Europe, Middle East and North Africa (EMENA) litigation team from scratch, transferring four members from within Shell and recruiting the rest externally, to bring the team to 12 lawyers plus paralegals.

Aside from daily supervision of the EMENA team, Morton also sits on the leadership team for Shell’s litigation group, alongside eight other global heads, and is responsible for managing the EMENA region’s budget.

One nomination in support of Morton’s inclusion as a Rising Star says: ‘Considering her current role is the first she has carried out in-house, she has demonstrated real management and business acumen in how she has structured and run the team, creating a genuine sense of team spirit and can-do work ethos.

‘It is striking in our interactions with Sarah’s team, how consistently they approach litigation and the business requirements; no small feat considering the diversity of backgrounds and experience within that team.’

Continue reading “Sarah Morton: Managing counsel, global litigation, Europe, Middle East and North Africa, Shell”

Posted on

Howard Landes: Chief counsel, corporate finance, BG Group

As BG Group’s chief corporate counsel, reporting to GC Graham Vinter, Howard Landes is the lawyer responsible for BG Group’s M&A and corporate finance matters globally.

Landes joined BG Group from Clifford Chance nine years ago and now regularly provides strategic advice to senior management on the energy giant’s major transactions and related issues. His key recent achievements include leading the legal function in successfully delivering multibillion-dollar securities fundraisings in the US and Europe in 2014, in executing one of Australia’s largest ever infrastructure deals, the $5bn sale by BG Group of its 540km pipeline network QCLNG Pipeline to APA Group.

Landes is described by a partner from Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer as ‘extremely sophisticated and astutely commercial’. The partner adds: ‘[Howard] operates like a Magic Circle partner and general counsel at the same time. He is very smart, [an] excellent negotiator, understands internal drivers and commands significant respect internally and externally.’

Another City partner comments: ‘Howard has the ability to effortlessly navigate the global landscape of an industry with a multiplicity of challenges. He is available and responsive 24/7 and his knowledge and experience provide confidence to make big-money decisions.’

Continue reading “Howard Landes: Chief counsel, corporate finance, BG Group”

Posted on

Martin Graham: Senior vice president, Oaktree Capital

Martin Graham joined Oaktree Capital from Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft in 2007 as assistant vice president (VP), becoming VP in January 2010 and senior VP in 2014. His role at Oaktree – one of the most influential houses in the alternative investment space – focuses on managing and executing pan-European distressed debt and private equity investments.

Key matters he has worked on include a $650m arbitration against a major international oil company and, in 2014, $1bn of debt fundraising across five different financing instruments for three portfolio companies.

The Freshfields-trained lawyer is commended externally for the volume and complexity of work he handled in 2014 alone, including a $320m senior secured bond by Harkand Finance; a $130m secured loan facility for Harkand Global Holdings backed by export credit support from the Norwegian government; and a €350m secured bond issued by SGD Group.

Continue reading “Martin Graham: Senior vice president, Oaktree Capital”

Posted on

Alice Marsden: Head of legal UK&I, Thomas Cook Group

Alice Marsden

Wragge & Co-trained, on qualification Alice Marsden joined Latham & Watkins as an associate before moving to Thomas Cook in January 2014 and becoming UK and Ireland head of legal three months later, just seven years after qualification.

An outsourcing lawyer by training, Marsden now heads a team of ten lawyers, including a number of new recruits, as Thomas Cook further boosts the quality of its UK legal offering.

In her own capacity Marsden supports the IT, HR, risk and marketing teams and has been heavily involved in Thomas Cook’s ongoing IT transformation programme, which will see it move globally onto the same IT infrastructure.

Paul Gilbert, chief executive of LBC Wise Counsel, comments: ‘I have been consulting in-house lawyers for 15 years and over that period I have been very fortunate to see some of the most talented young lawyers this country has. Among a few others who we have worked with, and who have also gone on to do great things, Alice has the temperament, drive and potential to be brilliant.’

Continue reading “Alice Marsden: Head of legal UK&I, Thomas Cook Group”

Posted on

Gary Partington: Associate General Counsel and Regional Head of HSBC Technology and Services legal, EMEA

Gary Partington qualified as an outsourcing lawyer at Ventura in April 2008 before joining HSBC’s technology and services (HTS) division in 2012, as senior legal counsel for supply contracts, providing operational and technical support to HSBC’s global businesses.

In April 2013, he was promoted to become Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) HTS head and has led on a number of major outsourcing deals for the global retail and investment bank.

HSBC did not have a dedicated HTS team prior to Partington’s arrival and he has been instrumental in creating and growing it into a dedicated 60-strong legal function.

One respected in-house consultant observes: ‘He is insightful, wise, generous and strategic. All in all, a top lawyer.’

Continue reading “Gary Partington: Associate General Counsel and Regional Head of HSBC Technology and Services legal, EMEA”

Posted on

Daisy Le Vay: Head of Litigation and Co-head of Corporate Legal, EMEA, Nomura

A former Linklaters litigation associate, Daisy Le Vay became an in-house lawyer with Virgin Atlantic in 2007 before joining Nomura in 2008 as an executive director in the Japanese bank’s litigation department.

As head of litigation, Le Vay is responsible for dealing with some of the most complex and high-profile issues Nomura faces. She manages a team of litigators and also co-heads a larger team of commercial, employment, IP and IT lawyers, as well as the company secretarial group.

One counsel at a Magic Circle firm comments: ‘Daisy is an exceptionally bright lawyer with a finely honed ability to spot the important points. She simultaneously gets every detail without losing the ability to see the wider picture. She is also an excellent and a confident communicator.’

What makes Le Vay stand out is her ‘exceptional intellectual ability and rigour. She is someone who always thinks strategically but can also make quick decisions and is totally in tune with her business’.

Continue reading “Daisy Le Vay: Head of Litigation and Co-head of Corporate Legal, EMEA, Nomura”

Posted on

Susan Henderson: European labour and employment head, GE

Susan Henderson leads GE’s centralised team of European labour and employment lawyers: a team she developed to provide support across GE’s diverse businesses and employee population – covering over 90,000 employees in 30 countries. Alongside this, Susan is currently focused on GE’s prospective $13.5bn acquisition and integration of Alstom’s energy businesses.

Before GE, Susan worked in-house with Legal & General, having started her career at McGrigors and Lovells.

Susan is qualified in Scotland, England and Wales and New York.

She is regularly invited to speak and write on both domestic and international legal issues and is a former chair of the UK In-House Employment Lawyers Network.

One Magic Circle partner comments: ‘Susan has fantastic technical knowledge but is also a very smart operator who has the absolute trust and confidence of her stakeholders. She can spot the key issues at the outset.’

Continue reading “Susan Henderson: European labour and employment head, GE”

Posted on

Emily Cane: Associate Counsel for EMEA commercial lines, AIG

According to one nomination in support of Emily Cane’s inclusion in this year’s report, she is ‘regarded as indispensable to the legal team and worth ten people’.

A former Norton Rose associate, who qualified into the firm’s corporate and regulatory insurance team, Cane joined AIG in January 2010, working for EMEA GC Chris Newby.

Newby is certainly impressed: ‘Emily has displayed not only legal acumen but tremendous adaptability, taking on a variety of increasingly senior and complex roles over the years. She has tackled each with pragmatism and legal zeal to provide legal services to the financial lines, Global Risk Solutions and the EMEA-wide group.’

Some of Cane’s most noteworthy roles include advising on transactions with FTSE 100 companies and developing AIG financial lines products as well as global captive reinsurance programmes, sanctions issues and multinational matters.

Continue reading “Emily Cane: Associate Counsel for EMEA commercial lines, AIG”

Posted on

Coca-Cola Enterprises

  • Vice president, legal: Paul van Reesch.
  • Team headcount: 30 lawyers

Coca-Cola Enterprises (CCE) is in charge of the manufacturing and distribution of Coca-Cola in Great Britain, involved in operations from packaging, supply and advertising, to major consumer-focused projects such as sponsoring the London Eye.

The team has a reputation for being imaginative and progressive despite its modest size. Under the lead of vice president, legal Paul van Reesch, the team at CCE deals with 80% of legal work in-house, going externally for complex niche advice such as competition or to review work done by the team from a risk perspective. Van Reesch comments: ‘The business has won an account for two big customers and the legal team was a fundamental part of that win.’

Recent achievements include bringing in around £5m in revenue from successful litigation and over £800,000 as a result of avoiding incorrect charges levied by CCE’s corporate customers.

The agile in-house team has increased efficiencies through a number of innovative technology deals, including a sizeable deal with Novatus, under which repeat contracts, including sponsorship contracts, trading contracts and non-disclosure agreements, will be automated.

The latter half of 2015 will see the deal with Novatus extended to provide customers with an online negotiation portal, meaning trackable changes can be made securely without the need for further e-mails. All of CCE’s contracts will be loaded on to the system and be available online. 

Further innovation is seeing the team assess whether it needs to formally enter a contract or rely on commercial heads of terms and common law, particularly where suppliers do not accept CCE’s contractual terms. Van Reesch comments: ‘We are trying to redefine the way we work to make the contractual process quicker.’

The team has also launched an app to help the business better understand its legal obligations. 

CCE will apply in 2015 to become one of a small number of in-house teams to achieve a Lexcel standard. Achieving the standard means preparing a handbook stating how the team operates, complying with various Solicitors Regulation Authority requirements such as service-level agreements and auditing files.

Van Reesch adds: ‘Last year we put together a vision for the legal team. How can I expect them to work hard and deliver if I’m not giving them the best possible platform on which to succeed?’

Continue reading “Coca-Cola Enterprises”

Posted on

Sainsbury’s

  • Head of legal services: Nick Grant.
  • Team headcount: 18 lawyers

Collaborative working is at the heart of the Sainsbury’s attitude towards external counsel, with head of legal services Nick Grant being an advocate for building strong links with the outside partners that he terms as a ‘legal community’.

According to one law firm partner: ‘The idea is that its law firms, instead of just competing with each other, co-operate together and with Sainsbury’s to mean
that two and two equals five.’

Another admiring external adviser comments: ‘Sainsbury’s has one of the hardest working in-house teams I know, which has delivered some massive projects for the business, and does so with enthusiasm, great team spirit and a good sense of humour.’

Grant’s team certainly has a full in-tray, working for the UK’s second largest supermarket chain with revenues of almost £24bn and 161,000 staff. The team covers a wide range of disciplines, including commercial litigation, construction, employment and intellectual property. Big mandates for the team over the last year include the high-profile joint venture with Dansk Supermarked to create the new Netto grocery chain in the UK and a High Court challenge against a Tesco ad campaign which claimed its own-label goods were cheaper.

In 2014, the in-house department conducted its third panel review, which saw reappointments for Addleshaw Goddard; Bond Dickinson; CMS Cameron McKenna; Croner; Dentons; DWF; Wragge Lawrence Graham & Co; Linklaters; Shepherd and Wedderburn; and Winckworth Sherwood.
The panel review focused on costs management and pressed advisers to work collaboratively. The process was run by Clare Russell and Paul Jenkinson from the legal team, in partnership with Paul Sykes from its procurement team.

Continue reading “Sainsbury’s”

Posted on

British American Tobacco

  • Regional general counsel, western Europe: Benoit Belhomme.
  • Group legal director and general counsel: Neil Withington.
  • Team headcount: 300 lawyers

Operating in one of the most litigious and heavily regulated industries, it is unsurprising that the London-headquartered British American Tobacco (BAT) is cited as having one of the most seasoned and capable teams in the business.

The team has been shaped by corporate lawyer Benoit Belhomme, who joined the company from the Paris office of Clifford Chance (CC) in 1992 to build up a substantive in-house function in Europe. Twenty-three years later and the corporate’s western Europe regional legal team comprises 58 lawyers, including 13 heads of legal to cover 42 markets with their respective teams. There is also a regional legal hub based in London. Covering a broad range of legal and compliance issues on a daily basis, the London team covers litigation; regulation including marketing restrictions and legislation, and excise laws; high value commercial transactions; intellectual property; and competition.
The business last year generated £3.6bn in western Europe (global revenue totalled £15.3bn in 2013) alongside £1.2bn operating profit, and working in a controversial industry means the team needs to be agile to ‘balance between risk management and business partnering’, says Belhomme.

‘This team is dynamic and able to respond to the high demand and pressures generated by the constantly changing regulatory environment,’ says Belhomme. ‘The profile of our lawyers requires commercial savviness, high interpersonal skills coupled with first class legal skills.’ Heavyweight names to watch include Christina Wagner, who served as head of legal in the northern European cluster before being appointed to head of legal and corporate affairs for global duty free in Switzerland.

CC private equity head Jonny Myers singles out the team, and references the company’s recent dispute with HM Revenue & Customs, which led to BAT being fined £650,000 for oversupplying cigarettes to Belgium, as evidence of the team’s ability to handle sensitive issues effectively. ‘Ben dealt with that issue with aplomb – calmly, sensibly, and got on with the rest of the day job. He gives his team the right balance, and the exposure to do their stuff without feeling cramped.’

Continue reading “British American Tobacco”

Posted on

Associated British Foods

  • Director of legal services and company secretary: Paul Lister.
  • Team headcount: 45 lawyers

Associated British Foods (ABF)’s profile has been achieved despite it running a lean team for a £13bn multinational. The team consists of 45 lawyers across 47 countries worldwide involved in a wide range of activities from retail to manufacturing. Its director of legal services, Paul Lister, comments: ‘I like to keep a tight team, because the tighter you are, the more opportunity you’ve got for internal growth.’

Daniel Hudson, a disputes partner at Herbert Smith Freehills, is impressed: ‘This well-organised and committed team has a broad understanding of the relevant commercial and other issues for ABF’s various global businesses as well as a sound grasp of the legal issues in play.’

In 2014 the team, which has household names such as Primark and Twinings in its remit, has taken innovative steps towards cost reduction, undertaking a project that analyses the department’s spend by country, subject matter, instructing counsel and law firm globally, and establishes where savings are best made. Major upcoming mandates for the team include taking Primark to the US market with the opening of a high-profile store in central Boston at the end of 2015.

Lister’s style of management is admired by his peers in the retail industry. Mark Amsden, general counsel (GC) and company secretary of supermarket chain Morrisons, says: ‘Paul Lister is a great bloke – he is really sensible, a good leader and empowers his team really well.’

Continue reading “Associated British Foods”

Posted on

US financials 2014: King & Spalding breaks the $1m revenue per lawyer figure alongside 8% revenue boost

King & Spalding is the latest US firm to post its financials for 2014, and has unveiled a respectable 8% increase in revenue to $934m from $861.4m, while it has notably surpassed the $1m revenue per lawyer threshold with a 7% rise to $1.055m for the first time in the firm’s history.

Continue reading “US financials 2014: King & Spalding breaks the $1m revenue per lawyer figure alongside 8% revenue boost”

Posted on

US financials round up: White & Case revenues increase, K&L figures are flat, while Cadwalader partner profits drop

US financial results for 2014 continue to stream in with White & Case becoming the latest firm to reveal an increase in revenue while both K&L Gates and Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft bucked the positive trend having turned in lacklustre performances.

Continue reading “US financials round up: White & Case revenues increase, K&L figures are flat, while Cadwalader partner profits drop”