Law firm Collyer Bristow has today announced the appointment of senior commercial real estate lawyer Simon Edwards, bringing considerable strength and experience to the firm’s 25-strong Real Estate practice.

Simon Edwards joined the firm on 2 January 2019 as a Partner.

He brings to the firm a career spanning 30 years in the London commercial real estate market, with particular expertise in managing the sale, purchase, asset management and financing of high value assets and portfolios.  Simon’s clients include funds, investors, high net worth individuals and property companies.

Commenting on his appointment, Simon said: “Collyer Bristow has a first-class reputation in the London real estate market, acting for some of the most innovative residential and commercial developers, investors and property companies.  The firm’s clients match perfectly my own experience and I am looking forward to working alongside the team and developing the firm’s practice further.”

Michael Grace, Partner at Collyer Bristow said: “We continue to see strong demand for our services and advice in the real estate and private wealth sectors and continue to look to grow and develop those teams.

“Simon’s experience and 30-year career in the London real estate market makes him a rare find, and we are thrilled with his decision to join the firm.  He brings a strong client following, deep understanding of the sector, and we look forward to the contributions he will make.”

Collyer Bristow’s 25-strong Real Estate practice acts for residential and commercial developers, investors, financiers, and high net worth individuals.  It has a growing client base in the build to rent and PRS sector, with clients developing and managing schemes in London and across the country.

Ends

About Collyer Bristow LLP:

1. Collyer Bristow LLP is a long-established law firm based in London, providing a wide range of legal services to high net worth individuals and SMEs. The firm has a particular reputation for its Private Wealth, Real Estate and Dispute Resolution services.
2. The firm has 85 fee earners which includes 30 partners. The firm and its individual lawyers are ranked in both Chambers and the Legal 500 directories.
3. The firm has an office in Geneva, supporting its Private Wealth practice, and is able to provide advice to international clients across multiple jurisdictions.
4. The firm’s highly experienced partners offer in-depth expertise and industry knowledge in commercial and residential real estate, corporate and commercial, dispute resolution, reputation management, employment, IP, insolvency, and tax and estate planning.
5. The ethos at Collyer Bristow is one of ‘personal’ service. All partners are professional yet approachable, working directly with clients to offer high quality legal advice as well as tailoring services to their individual needs. The firm’s core objective is to deliver consistently excellent services to clients.
6. The firm has been championing emerging talent in contemporary art for almost thirty years. It supports and promotes young artists through its in-house art gallery and independently curated exhibition programme.

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The High Court has granted permission for a challenge to the lawfulness of sections 35 and 38 Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008 (‘HFEA 2008’) in R (H) v Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (‘SSHSC’).

In a decision dated 20 December 2018 Pepperall J granted permission to the claimant (‘H’), a minor to apply for a judicial review of the SSHSC’s defence of the lawfulness of sections 35 and 38 of the HFEA 2008.  The impugned sections provide that the husband of a surrogate mother is to be treated as ‘the father’ of the resulting child unless it is shown that he did not consent to the placing in the surrogate mother of the embryo or the sperm and eggs or to her artificial insemination (as the case may be).

H, who was born as a result of a surrogacy arrangement governed by the HFEA 2008, seeks a declaration that sections 35 and 38 of the HFEA 2008 to the extent that they prevent her biological father from being recorded as her father on her birth certificate and treated as her legal father infringe her rights under articles 8 and 14 of the European Convention for the protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. H also seeks a declaration of incompatibility under section 4 Human Rights Act 1998.

The claim will now proceed to a full hearing.

Please click here to access the Order granting permission.

Richard Alomo and S Chelvan act for H (through her litigation friend, B) via the Bar Council’s Public Access Scheme.  B is the same-sex partner of H’s biological father (‘A’).

Richard Alomo is a member of the family and public law groups at No5, view his profile here: https://www.no5.com/barristers/barrister-details/469-richard-alomo/

S Chelvan is a member of the international human rights and immigration groups at No5, view his profile here: https://www.no5.com/barristers/barrister-details/299-s-chelvan/

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Goodwin Procter has further expanded its European life sciences and technology practice, taking on a new partner from Taylor Wessing in London. Andrew Davis, who began his career at Allen & Overy, joins after a seven-year stint at Taylor Wessing, where he was made a partner in 2014. Davis has worked with clients such as […]

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Social mobility is not only high on the agenda for the Junior Lawyers Division it is also an issue close to my heart as the invisible barriers to entering the legal profession persist for students from lower socio-economic backgrounds.

In 2017, the Sutton Trust found that the UK is one of the worst of the thirty seven countries in the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) for income mobility – the ability of people to access professions outside of their class background and earn more than their parents. In the UK, only one in eight children from low-income backgrounds goes on to have a high-earning career.

It’s high time we really think about what ‘social mobility’ means and how we can make more progress in this area, although it is worth noting that fourteen of the top fifty places in the recent UK social mobility awards were taken by law firms. So progress is being made, albeit slowly.

We need to look at the ways in which potential entrants to the legal profession are at a disadvantage to other students and how this can be improved to ensure that the playing field is levelled out. This will improve not only diversity but also the talent pool.

Unfortunately the disadvantages start from someone’s first day at school. There are things which you might not even think about day to day if you yourself are not from a poorer background. For example, two pupils may go to the same school together and share the same friends and do the same homework but one will go home to a house without WIFI as their family can’t afford such a luxury on their household budget.

This is just one example of the financial exclusion someone might face on a day-to day basis that makes it harder for them to do their homework and attain the best grades needed for a career in law. Why should that pupil have less chance at a career in law than the other?

Of course the student who does not have the internet at home or whose family struggles to put food on the table will have a steeper struggle to enter into a profession as competitive as the legal profession. Grades are unfortunately not always then an accurate reflection of a person’s ability or aptitude for the profession and this is something which firms must look at and adjust accordingly. Candidates from lower socio-economic backgrounds will often miss out on the grades required due to their personal circumstances.

It continues from there. The transport to the vacation scheme/training contract interviews, the clothes for those interviews, the ability to undertake work experience without pay. It is time we collectively stop and think about the unspoken things that affect students from lower income backgrounds. The change cannot happen without awareness.

We need to encourage firms to look at ways to improve. This might be, for example, by following in the footsteps of firms which are partnering with local universities with mentoring schemes aimed at supporting students from lower socio-economic backgrounds.

It’s key to remember that the educational disadvantages which tie in with someone’s socio-economic background start early. One thing which I have personally found really worthwhile is going in to local schools to talk about careers in law and everything that involves, right up to making CVs stand out without having the financial resources to afford unpaid internships or trips abroad. Find out whether your firm run something similar and, if not, perhaps contact your local schools direct or show your initiative and suggest that your firm gets involved in a project like this to build on its ties with the community.

If you work at a firm perhaps you could encourage that firm to start a scheme where one placement each year is based on the best submission on a legal ‘hot topic’ from someone from a poorer background or raise awareness of programmes or foundations which exist to help students from lower socio-economic backgrounds.

It is worth mentioning at this point ‘the social mobility pledge’ launched by Parliament to commit employers to supporting social mobility through initiatives such as CV-blind and contextual recruiting methods as well as outreach work and apprenticeship schemes. I am happy to say that my firm, CMS, is one of the nineteen law firms signed up to such a pledge – why not ask your firm to sign up? Change starts with you. Use your voice to help others.

These initiatives might just do something to help the next generation who can’t afford their school lunches to have a shot at the legal profession if that is where their ambitions and their talents lie. Let’s not exclude our best because of financial restraints.

Prisca Wharton is an associate at CMS and a Law Society Council member, representing trainee solicitors and LPC students

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KPMG is continuing its push into the legal market with the raid of two partners from Norton Rose Fulbright‘s international network.

The hires include corporate tax partner Angela Savin, who has joined KPMG’s tax litigation and disputes team in London, and Sydney -based Zein El Hassan, who helmed the firm’s financial services risk advisory team in Australia and is to bolster the accountancy firm’s legal services there. 

A longtime Norton Rose lawyer, Savin joined the firm in 2004 and was made partner in 2010. Over eight years she has focused on tax matters and capital markets transactions, also developing the UK tax treatment of Islamic financial structures. She started her career as an associate at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer in 1999.

“We confirm that Angela Savin has left the practice; we wish her well in her future endeavours,” Dominic Stuttaford, head of tax for EMEA and Brazil at Norton Rose Fulbright, said in a statement.

El Hassan joined Norton Rose in 2012 from Sydney-based firm Clayton Utz. As head of the firm’s financial services risk advisory team, he advised on the use of technology as a means to distribute financial products, as well as acting on a number of regulatory remediation projects.

His exit from Norton Rose’s Australian office echoes similar defections that occurred last year following its merger with Henry Davis York in December 2017, when the firm lost four partners; Sydney financial institutions head Chris Redden to Ashurst, corporate partners Anthony Latimer and Iain Laughland to Bird & Bird and Mills Oakley respectively, and dispute resolution partner Melanie McKean to Ashurst.

These are the latest moves in a series of hires that have seen Norton Rose lawyers entering the Big Four ecosystem. In 2015, KPMG turned to Norton Rose when it nabbed senior associate Kennedy Masterton-Smith as a director in the financial services regulatory team. That same year, Deloitte also attracted Norton Rose global chief information officer Sheila Doyle, who took on the same position at the accountancy firm to boost digital innovation. The following year, PWC hired a Norton Rose real estate funds partner Natalie Breen to spearhead the opening of its Singapore outpost along with a corporate partner from Ashurst.

Norton Rose Fulbright recently announced 46 partner promotions across its global offices, after switching to an American-style calendar year-end last year. The firm did not make any partner promotions at all in 2018, having overhauled its financial reporting following its merger with US firm Chadbourne & Parke in 2016.

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Dechert has started off 2019 with two partner additions, recruiting funds expertise into both its Dublin and Luxembourg office.

The US firm has hired Maples & Calder’s Carol Widger as its new managing partner of Dublin, a financial services lawyer that advises companies on services to investment funds. She replaces Declan O’Sullivan in the role, although he will remain a partner of the firm.

On the Continent, Ashurst’s Marianna Tothova joins Dechert as a partner in London and Luxembourg. Tothova was a senior associate and then counsel at Ashurst, which only last year opened its first office in the European country. Prior to that she was a lawyer in Linklaters’ investment management group.

Gus Black, co-chair of Dechert’s financial services group, said: “Many of our clients have business spanning Ireland and Luxembourg, and these appointments signal our commitment to both of these important fund centres as well as our ‘jurisdiction neutral’ advice model”.

Dechert was one of the first international law firms to launch in Dublin, with the hire of William Fry funds partner Declan O’Sullivan and three associates in 2010. It then went on to hire Invesco Perpetual’s head of legal Michelle Moran months later, who nevertheless left in 2013 for Ropes & Gray. She became a partner at K&L Gates in 2017.

Interest in Dublin has ramped up since the Brexit vote, with a swarm of firms taking a look at the Republic of Ireland as it was indicated that some British businesses would look to leave the UK following the referendum. Last year, DLA Piper, Simmons & Simmons and Covington & Burling all opened operations in the city.

Dechert meanwhile has had a presence in Luxembourg for nearly two decades, opening in the country in 2001 through a merger with local firm Brucher & Seimetz. Marc Seimetz is still a partner at Dechert in the financial services group.

Luxembourg, like Dublin, is set to feature more prominently in firm’s “to do” lists as the UK gears up for Brexit. It is home to a wealth of asset managers, with further investment businesses likely to look at the region as a place to do business.

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Clyde & Co has launched a programme to raise the profile of female lawyers by giving them more roles as spokespeople for the firm.

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By William Hoke

Taxpayers frequently complain about delayed refunds, but a Portuguese company has waited over two decades for its money. It finally got paid December 7 but will have to wait somewhat longer for the interest.

Joaquim Pedro Lampreia, a tax lawyer for Viera de Almeida, represents a taxpayer that
challenged a 1996 assessment for €1.1 million made against its 1992 corporate tax return. Lampreia said the company is a conglomerate operating in the forest products and industrial sector and doesn’t want its name to be disclosed.

The company paid the assessment, which it then protested. The taxpayer’s administrative level challenge, which continued until 2002, was unsuccessful, and it filed a court appeal the following year. The original judicial decision on the case was handed down in 2011, only to be overturned in 2012 on procedural grounds. On
remand, the lower court again decided against the company. In 2016 the Central Administrative Court South ruled in the taxpayer’s favor (07519/ 14, August 2, 2016.)

The company’s long battle for a refund was profiled in a December 3 article in the Jornal de Negocios, a Portuguese newspaper. Lampreia told Tax Notes during a phone interview December 7 that his client had just received a refund for the tax
payment. “It was probably due to the news report,” he said. ”Somebody in hierarchy must have shouted the order. I don’t think it was a coincidence.” Lampreia said the refund was most recently accruing interest at a rate of 12 percent a year,
bringing the total to more than €1.3 million. He said he expects the interest to be paid in the next few days or weeks.

While administrative claims are now typically resolved within six months to a year, once a tax case enters the courts, things get bogged down for years and even decades, Lampreia said. He attributed the problem to understaffing in a court system with too few tax judges and too few tax courts.

“Litigation has increased exponentially since 2002-2003, when the tax authority started to get much more aggressive and taxpayers countered by filing claims in court,” Lampreia said. “But there was no investment in those courts by the successive governments, so we have been facing this situation for many years now, and it’s very
embarrassing from our point of view because we have clients and foreign investors who find it puzzling, to say the least, the amount of time it takes.”

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Barclays head of incentives law Andrew Patterson has joined magic circle firm Clifford Chance as a partner, having been with the bank for nearly nine years. The former Ashurst associate went in-house to Barclays incentives team in 2010 after spending over six years with the City firm, qualifying in 2006. Patterson joined the bank as […]

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Baker McKenzie has taken on two new partners from White & Case’s London office, after a series of hires into its banking and finance teams last year. Capital markets partners Rob Mathews and David Becker will join Bakers’ corporate finance practice. Both partners, who specialise in high yield, were partners at US outfit White & Case for […]

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Two members of Jones Day’s project finance team have decamped from its London office, one of whom has resurfaced at Baker Botts. Nick Collins has joined Baker Botts’ growing London offering, while Myles Mantle’s next role has not yet been lined up, The Lawyer understands. Both left the US firm at the end of last year. Collins […]

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Dechert’s former trade co-chair Miriam Gonzalez is to join Cohen & Gresser, where she will split her time between Washington DC and London.

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On Jan. 7, 2019, Fertin Pharma A/S announced that it had acquired Tab Labs Inc.

Fertin Pharma, headquartered in Vejle, Denmark, is the leading independent B2B developer and manufacturer of medicated chewing gum, primarily nicotine chewing gum used for withdrawal management in the process of tobacco cessation. Tab Labs is a full-service, private label contract manufacturer of functional tablets and chewing gum based in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Tab Labs will serve as an important bridgehead for Fertin Pharma in the large North American market for dietary supplement products delivered through innovative and convenient systems such as chewing gum, mints, lozenges and Zapliq®. Tab Labs will also provide MedCan Pharma A/S, an affiliate of Fertin Pharma, with an interesting opportunity to serve the Canadian market with edible types of Cannabinoid containing products.

Gowling WLG advised Fertin Pharma in this acquisition with a team that included Stefan McConnell (corporate/M&A), Paul Carenza (tax), Krista Schofer (employment) and Karoline Clarke (real estate), assisted by student-at-law Kean Silverthorn.

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By Denis G. Silva, Jill Dunn

On Jan. 4, 2019, Metalla Royalty & Streaming Ltd. (TSXV: MTA) (OTCQX: MTAFF) (FRANKFURT: X9CP) announced that it had closed its oversubscribed brokered private placement of units for aggregate proceeds of approximately $6.8 million.

The offering was led by Haywood Securities Inc. on behalf of a syndicate of agents, including PI Financial Corp. and Canaccord Genuity Corp.

Gowling WLG advised Metalla with respect to this transaction with a team that included Denis Silva and Jill Dunn.

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Gowling WLG and Indian law firm Naik Naik & Company have entered into a revised referral agreement with a commitment to further strengthen and deepen their existing relationship.

Established in 2004, Naik Naik & Company has two offices in Mumbai and strong capabilities in a wide range of sectors and services. The firm has worked closely with Gowling WLG (UK) LLP and its India Group, jointly headed by corporate partner Sunil Kakkad, for several years.

The revised referral agreement extends the relationship with Naik Naik & Company to include Gowling WLG (Canada) LLP in addition to Gowling WLG (UK) LLP. The agreement will enable Gowling WLG clients in need of legal advice in India – or those seeking to enter the Indian market – to access Naik Naik & Company’s broad suite of legal services.

In turn, the agreement will also allow Naik Naik & Company to support its domestic clients looking to expand beyond India’s borders through referrals to one or more of Gowling WLG’s offices across Canada, the UK, Europe, the Middle East and Asia. The firm’s clients will benefit from Gowling WLG’s deep expertise in advising Indian businesses on a variety of corporate, dispute resolution and intellectual property matters across numerous key sectors, from automotive, energy and tech to life sciences, real estate and media.

Andrew Witts, chairman of Gowling WLG (UK) LLP, said: “This is a further step in an already important relationship and represents our commitment to Naik Naik & Company and India as a crucial jurisdiction for Gowling WLG and our clients.”

Peter Lukasiewicz, chief executive officer of Gowling WLG (Canada) LLP, added: “More and more, our clients are looking for strategic legal advice on a wide range of business issues in India. Our referral agreement with Naik Naik & Company will facilitate the delivery of this advice – and help clients take full advantage of the commercial opportunities the country affords.”

Commenting on the agreement, Ameet B. Naik, founder and managing partner of Naik Naik & Company, said: “The Indian economy is witnessing a notable shift in trade paradigms and the evolution of new and emerging markets. Our renewed agreement demonstrates our commitment to strengthening our ties and forging a deeper relationship with Gowling WLG and, more importantly, allow our clients to navigate the global marketplace with confidence alongside a law firm with an impressive international footprint and expertise that is known the world over.”

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Gowling WLG has extended its “best friend” relationship with Indian law firm Naik Naik & Company from its UK LLP to the firm’s Canada arm as post-merger integration continues.

With a view of the Indian legal market’s growing importance, Anglo-Canadian firm Gowling WLG has strengthened its referral relationship with existing Indian “best friend” Naik Naik & Company, which is based in Mumbai and has around 50 legal professionals. Previously, the referral agreement only covers Gowling WLG (UK ) LLP, but the revised agreement will extend the relationship to Gowling WLG (Canada) LLP.

The firm’s collaboration with Naik Naik & Company originated in 2010, when legacy UK firm Lawrence Graham started an informal relationship with the Indian firm. The two firms then entered into a formal agreement in 2013.

The relationship was carried over following Lawrence Graham’s merger with Wragge & Co in the following year and continued within the UK LLP after its combination with Canadian firm Gowling in 2016.

“This is a further step in an already important relationship and represents our commitment to Naik Naik & Company and India as a crucial jurisdiction for Gowling WLG and our clients,” said Andrew Witts, chairman of Gowling WLG (UK) LLP.

Gowling WLG (Canada) LLP CEO Peter Lukasiewicz added: “More and more, our clients are looking for strategic legal advice on a wide range of business issues in India. Our referral agreement with Naik Naik & Company will facilitate the delivery of this advice – and help clients take full advantage of the commercial opportunities the country affords.”

Through the expanded relationship, Naik Naik & Company is able to better support its domestic clients looking to expand beyond India’s borders through referrals to Gowling WLG’s network of 18 offices across Canada, the UK, Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

“The Indian economy is witnessing a notable shift in trade paradigms and the evolution of new and emerging markets,” said Naik Naik & Company founder and managing partner Ameet Naik.

“Our renewed agreement allows our clients to navigate the global marketplace with confidence alongside a law firm with an impressive international footprint and expertise that is known the world over,” he said.

Gowling WLG’s move comes at a time when the liberalisation of India’s legal market came to a stall following several key developments in 2016 and 2017. Despite being barred from having a presence in India, leading global firms have had an active Indian practice.

Linklaters, for example, has a long-standing relationship with local firm Talwar Thakore & Associates. Ashurst entered into a “best friend” relationship with Indian Law Partners (ILP) in 2012. Last August, Ashurst and ILP co-counselled for Hyundai as the South Korean motor giant in investing in Indian self-drive car rental startup Revv.

Clifford Chance, which ended its two-year “best friends” tie-up with AZB & Partners in 2011, remains a sought-after international legal advisor on India related deals. Most recently, it acted on Intermediate Capital Group’s $1bn takeover of Standard Chartered’s private equity assets. The magic circle firm worked alongside Khaitan & Co in the transaction.

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Linklaters and Deloitte have partnered up with the crowdfunding platform that propelled digital bank Monzo to stardom to launch a new investment programme aimed at supporting financial inclusion startups. The project is helmed by platform Crowdcube, which recently saw challenger bank Monzo, now valued at £1bn, raking in £20m in a crowdfunding campaign that lasted […]

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We shout a lot these days and we seem to have forgotten how to listen. Even if we are listening it is, more often than at any time in the history of mankind, within our own bubble as we plug in the earphones and pull up the audio drawbridge.

There’s a lot of shouting on social media too, which has turned us all into miniature broadcasting stations. Take this article for example. Go back a few years and I’d have been declaiming this atop a soap box at Speakers’ Corner in Hyde Park but now I can tweet about it, foist it upon friends and associates through emails or even let Google shout about it for me!

Recently there was the news that commuting on the London Underground equates to “being at a rock concert” in some sections of the Northern, Jubilee and Central lines. Hadn’t really noticed? That’s because every day our ears are bombarded by a cacophony of noise and yet the brain manages to filter the fuzz allowing us to focus on the audio information that is important.

Not listening is a big problem in every business. The ability to stop, forget about you, and hear what someone is saying, is a courtesy that seems to have eroded as the modern world has got louder.

Most people are under the impression that business is all about getting your point across. Well, in some respects it is, but too few grasp the fact that interaction with another person is a two- way process: I talk, you listen. You talk, I listen.

Leaving deities, despots and dictators aside, in the history of deals, few have been made where just one person talks. That’s because deals, when signing on the dotted line, are dependent on the give and take of relationships.

At every level of business, many firms suffer because people don’t listen. This results in a failure to trust advice, frustration and individuals insisting on doing everything because nobody else can do the job properly. Invariably it is often the blood pressure, not the profit margin that begins to soar.

Great leaders listen. They take the time to understand what motivates and frustrates those they lead and the only way to do this is to listen.  We all have things that we know a great deal about, but the world is full of lots of other people who know a great deal about other things. Therefore, listening is a wonderful opportunity to learn.

Listening is incredibly flattering.  Really listening that is, and it takes a bit of effort.  In this fast-paced frantic world, it is very easy to think that we have listened when in actual fact all we have done is heard.  How many times, for example, have you been on a call whilst looking at emails – that is not listening; that is splitting your focus.  Active listening involves removing distractions and focussing completely on the person who is speaking and what they are saying.

An important part of listening is subduing personal ego and not about waiting for your turn to speak.  If someone needs to talk to you they do not necessarily appreciate your continual raising of what they have said with your own achievements or experiences.

Don’t turn the conversation on to you, don’t be over zealous in you rush to offer an opinion or chuck in endless meaningless statements along the lines of “I know what you mean” but rather be considered in your approach and clarify that you have understood what has been communicated to you through the judicious use of questions and, where possible, use some of the language that has been delivered to you back to the speaker in your question to them.

Listening is a fundamental skill in pretty much any relationship; it is perhaps the most sincere form of respect one can give another person and depending on your own level of self-awareness you will know if you are a good listener or if you need to focus on some developing some of the crucial techniques of how to listen effectively.

In the words of Ernest Hemingway, ‘I like to listen.  I have learned a great deal from listening.  Most people never listen.’

Luan de Burgh is a professional public speaker and presentation coach.

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Experts from across the market give their view on the past 12 months and offer predictions for 2019.

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Gateley, the first law firm in the UK to go public, forecasts its annual revenue to skyrocket to over £100m in its fourth year as a listed entity.

Revealing its interim results this morning, the firm calculated that a string of acquisitions will contribute £13m of this increase, adding up to a revenue that is expected to reach “not less than £102m”.

The firm’s interim results show growth of 10 per cent for the first six months of the firm’s financial year, giving it a revenue of £46.4m. Carrying on in this vein would ensure Gateley beats its last financials for the full year in which it posted turnover of £83.4m.

Profit before tax increased almost 19 per cent from £4.2m to £5m in the first six months of the year. Similarly, adjusted earnings before interest and tax (EBITDA) saw a 24.8 per cent rise from £5.3m to £6.6m.

The results confirm the upward trend displayed by Gateley since 2015, when it became the first UK commercial law firm to list on the alternative investment market. At that time, Gatelely’s revenue was nearly £61m.

The rise in funds fueled a steady series of acquisitions that started in April 2016 with the purchase of tax advisory business Capitus for £2.72m.

In November 2016, it rebounded from the loss of its Scottish arm to Addleshaw Goddard, growing its net assets by 15.8 per cent in the following year up to December 2017, from £12.6m to £16.4m, and bringing in six new partners.

Its portfolio, which is expected to contribute £13m to its end-of-year revenue, has been consistently growing. It now includes property consultancy business Gateley Hamer, which was acquired in September 2016; housebuilder specialists GCL Solicitors, bought in May 2018; and non-legal Human Capital consultancy business Kiddy & Partners, which was nabbed in July 2018.

Since Gatelely listed, a further four firms have debuted on the alternative investment market; Gordon Dadds went public in July 2017 followed by Keystone Law in November 2017. Last year saw two listings: Rosenblatt Solicitors (May 2018) and Knights Law (June 2018).

It is understood that DWF will list this year on the London Stock Exchange’s main market, which would make it the sixth firm to do so.

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