Freeths’ revenue grew 14 per cent over 2015/16 to £63.8m, prompting a 6.65 per cent bonus for all staff.

In the 2015/16 financial year, Freeths’ turnover jumped from £55.8m to £63.8m, continuing the firm’s strong financial run of recent years.

As a result, Freeths staff will be given a bonus payment in May, which is slightly higher than the 5 per cent bonus received at the end of the 2014/15 financial year.

Freeths has seen double-digit growth for a number of years, reporting a turnover increase of 12 per cent in 2014/15 and 23 per cent during 2013/14. The results mean it is well on course to become a £100m business by 2020 – a goal set out by chief executive Peter Smith back in 2014.

At the start of this month, Oxford firm Henmans Freeth changed its named to Freeths, having been acquired by what was then Freeth Cartwright in 2012.

The Oxford office is the second largest of Freeths’ 11 bases, with Birmingham, Milton Keynes and Leeds staff all moving into new offices over 2015/16.

Baker & McKenzie’s partners have elected London managing partner Paul Rawlinson as the firm’s next global chairman.

Rawlinson will be the firm’s first UK-based chairman, and will succeed Eduardo Leite in October this year. He will remain London managing partner – a role he has held since 2013 – until then.

Rawlinson beat EMEA chair Gary Senior, Latin America chair Claudia Prado and former Paris managing partner Eric Lasry in a contested election for the role.

Leite replaced John Conroy as global chair in 2010 and was handed a two-year extension in 2014 after not being opposed in the firm’s internal elections.

Rawlinson joins Bakers in 1986 and was promoted to the partnership in 1996. He led the firm’s global intellectual property group between 2004 and 2010 before becoming London managing partner. He also serves on the global policy committee.

He has helped develop a number of initiatives at Bakers, including the establishment of the firm’s service centres in Belfast and Manila.

Chinese firm Jingtian & Gongcheng, Italian firm Bonelli Erede Pappalardo, Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton and Latham & Watkins have scored key roles in the first deal by Chinese investors for control of a top European soccer club.

Chinese electronics retailer Suning Commerce Group has announced that it is buying a near 70 per cent stake in FC Internazionale Milano (Inter Milan) for €270m (£220m).

Jingtian & Gongcheng acted as the Chinese buyer’s main coordinating counsel. The Chinese firm instructed Slaughter and May best friend Bonelli to provide local law advice on the transaction.

Jingtian’s team is led by Beijing-based corporate partners Hu Zhengzheng and Gao Xiang. Bonelli’s team is headed by Milan M&A partner Stefano Micheli.

Latham & Watkins was the legal adviser to International Sports Capital, owned by Inter Milan’s president Erick Thohir, on the sale. Its team was headed by Singapore finance head Timothy Hia and included Milan corporate head Stefano Sciolla. Following the deal, International Sports Capital will become the sole minority shareholder in the club and Thohir retains his position as the club’s president.

Internazionale Holding, owned by the club’s former president and Italian oil tycoon Massimo Moratti, sought out long-standing advisor Cleary Gottlieb’s Milan partner Roberto Casiti for advice. Casiti was supported by senior associate Gerolamo da Passano. Upon completion, Internazionale Holding will cease to be a shareholder and Moratti will exit the club.

Starting your legal career can be daunting: your seniors and peers are very capable and technical ability is almost assumed. But being a successful lawyer is not just about the technical law, and building strong soft skills is key to success.

As I qualified, one way I did this was by getting involved in the diversity programme at my firm and learning more about the soft skills, the business acumen and workplace psychology that those at the top of their field have mastered in order to progress their career success. Themes that ran through the majority of events I have attended over the last few years focused on two key aspects: confidence and networking.

But these two concepts are quite tricky to demystify, so our StepUp Network at Hogan Lovells, which is run for and by trainees, associates and senior associates, hosted an event earlier this month in an attempt to do so. Our StepUp Network aims to create targeted opportunities for networking, business development, and growth so our lawyers were asked to invite a client to host.

Guest speaking at the event was Phanella Mayall Fine, an ex-lawyer and banker turned career coach, who has extensively researched the different aspects of career progression. She shared some of the wisdom from her upcoming book (coincidentally titled Step Up) with our guests.

Phanella articulated something that really stuck with me: while networking with the right individuals and providing great legal service are more tangible and identifiable stepping stones that are likely to help you move ahead in your career, “confidence is a pre-cursor to almost all career progression behaviours”.

Some of the best practical tips to building confidence that I have picked up over the years and learned from Phanella are:

• Get involved.

Say yes. Whether it is a new client initiative, joining the firm’s football team, working on a pro bono project or joining a diversity network, saying yes to new opportunities may be one of the most straight-forward ways of getting to know your firm and the people across it.

Especially as a new joiner to an organisation, putting your hand up to volunteer for the firm’s fundraiser this year will put you in touch with individuals in your organisation that you may not come across in your day-to-day fee earning – not only does this build your internal network and perhaps put you in a better position to cross-sell your firm’s capabilities, but more people within the firm will know who you are, and you never know what position someone in your internal network might be in five to ten years from now, or in the next promotion round.

If they don’t know you, how can they promote you?

• Mini-challenge yourself.

Break it down. A challenge is, by definition, something that is quite difficult to overcome and will take time to conquer, but just as you develop as a solicitor, you have to start somewhere. Get the basics right and build on that success to gradually become an expert in your field. Applying this same logic to different challenges in your career can help to focus your energy and yield greater results.

Phanella gave us a great tip: break the challenge into three steps. For example, many people, including myself, can find networking challenging, but it can be surmountable with the right kind of confidence. Before jumping into the deep end and challenging yourself to mingle with the general counsel of a major potential client, which can be daunting, your first mini- challenge can be to have coffee with the person at your level who works at your client and with whom you have just completed that big transaction.

Breaking these challenges down into more attainable steps can make your success more tangible and will gradually build your confidence so you can attempt greater networking challenges.

• Have a story.

Tell it. Develop your personal brand, and consider what impression it leaves. Successful businesses have a key mission statement and vision, which is underpinned by a strong brand. The brand is how others will perceive the business and remember it.

Understanding personal brand from this perspective highlights why that ‘elevator pitch’ and why spending time developing and refining your own personal brand is so important. If you don’t know your story, how can others buy it?

Each of these practical tips are key to building your confidence by helping you identify what you value in your career, where you would like your career to go and how you can get there.

Katy Bagerman is an associate at Hogan Lovells. Phanella Mayall Fine’s book, Step Up: Your Perfect Career in 10 Minutes A Day, is out on 1st September with Ebury (Random House). 

Khaitan & Co advised Beroe Consulting India Private Limited and its promoters in relation to an investment made by Access India Fund and certain other investors for a significant minority investment.

Beroe Consulting India Private Limited is in the business of procurement research and consulting and provides services in India, US, Europe and Singapore.

Vineet Shingal, Associate Partner; Kinshuk Jhunjhunwala, Senior Associate and Shreya Dua, Associate represented the client on the transaction.

Khaitan & Co successfully advised Alkem Laboratories Limited and its office bearers in relation to a Competition Commission of India decision which penalised Alkem to the tune of INR 74.63 crores for allegedly facilitating the All Kerala Chemists & Druggists Association in its anti-competitive practices of demanding No Objection Certificates from stockists, and for indulging in anti-competitive practices.

An appeal was filed on behalf of Alkem against the CCI’s order before the Competition Appellate Tribunal which based on our arguments issued a decision allowing the appeals of Alkem and setting aside the CCI’s order.

Manas Kumar Chaudhuri, Partner; Sagardeep Rathi, Principal Associate; Pranjal Prateek, Senior Associate; Nikita Agarwal, Associate and Gaurav Bansal, Associate represented Alkem before the CCI and COMPAT.

Michael Bowes QC and Katarina Sydow of Outer Temple Chambers were invited to participate in the Global Sustainability Network Forum at Westminster Abbey on 31 May 2016.

Discussion focused on how governments could be encouraged to tackle human trafficking and modern day slavery, including by enacting and applying legislation such as the Modern Slavery Act 2015.

Outer Temple’s members are experienced in advising governments, civil society and commercial organisations on the rule of law, with particular expertise in transparency and anti-corruption measures.

After an open competition, John McKendrick QC will replace Rupert Jones as Attorney General for Anguilla.

The effective exercise of John’s mandate will start on 1 September this year and is expected to last for two years.

John is a highly experienced litigator and adviser with a diverse practice distinguished by his formidable advocacy, his pragmatic hands-on approach and his ability to build relationships with clients. He was appointed a part time judge at the age of 34 and took silk at 39. Being a versatile advocate with a diverse practice, he works in the UK, across Latin America and in the Caribbean.

John has recently visited Anguilla in order to meet his future colleagues and other stakeholders.

The conference, which is to be held on Thursday 9 June 2016, is being organised by the Centre of Construction Law at Kings’s College. It aims to discuss the issues arising in the relationship between constructors and consumers, with a particular emphasis on the latter’s legal rights and protection.

The outcome of the event is to define the best practice to use in this area of construction law, to identify directions to follow and to facilitate the interaction between practitioners in the field.

Ian Bailey is recognised as one of Australia’s foremost construction practitioners, with a deep industry knowledge gained through his previous career as an architect (ten years on commercial and residential projects in Sydney). More information about his activity is available here.

Many practitioners as well as theoreticians have expressed their intention to speak at the conference. The full list of speakers, booking details and other useful information are available now.

For enquiries, please contact the Conference Administrator, Elizabeth Alabaster, at elizabeth.alabaster@kcl.ac.uk or at (+44)(0)20-7848 2685.

Philip Dayle has secured the acquittal of a nurse (X) who was charged with tasting methadone whilst on duty in a substance misuse role at a high security prison. The allegation was made by a colleague, who claimed that she saw X use her finger to swipe methadone that had spilled on a work surface, then place her finger in her mouth. This wrongdoing was supposedly committed  while X – along with the said colleague – was administering methadone to prisoners as part of the prison’s substance misuse support programme.

X had been suspended from her job on account of this allegation. She later took up employment at a nursing home, while she fought this charge. The charge was brought by the Nursing and Midwifery Council ( NMC) – the regulator of the nursing profession. If the charge had been found proven, in all likelihood X would have been struck off as a nurse.

A three member panel of the NMC’s Competence and Conduct Committee heard this matter over three (3) days. They found the story advanced by X’s colleague constituting the charge, to be “improbable”, X’s denial was to be preferred.

Philip Dayle’s has a practice in professional discipline and his profile may be seen here.

Walker Morris is pleased to announce that it will be one of four joint sponsors for the Yorkshire Finance Directors’ Awards 2016.

Now in their 14th year, the Awards bring together the professional community to recognise exceptional performance and contribution from the region’s top Finance Directors.

Richard Naish who is heading the initiative from Walker Morris with Debbie Jackson commented:

“Walker Morris is delighted to be associated with these prestigious awards which, now in their 14^th year, have firmly established themselves as one of the region’s leading awards and networking events.

“As a firm we work hard on talent engagement to attract, retain, and develop the highest calibre, nationally recognised lawyers throughout our organisation. Therefore we are delighted to co-sponsor these awards which celebrate excellence and outstanding finance professionals from across a wide range of industries.”

Other sponsors of the awards are The Sewell Business Group; accountancy and business advisory firm BDO and corporate insurance broking, risk/claims management firm Lockton

Winners of the Awards will be announced at a celebratory dinner for approximately 200 guests on Thursday, 20 October 2016 at The Queens Hotel, Leeds.

To enter, or nominate, please click here

Ogier, instructed by Clifford Chance, has advised long standing client Elian on matters of Guernsey, Jersey, BVI and Cayman law in respect of the sale by management and Electra Partners LLP to Intertrust for a total consideration of £435m.

Elian is a trust and corporate services administrator with 615 employees across key jurisdictions. It is a market leader in Jersey and has a strong presence in the UK and 13 other jurisdictions, 10 of which overlap with Intertrust. Elian is particularly strong in services for Capital Markets, having acquired SFM in 2015, and for Private Equity & Real Estate Fund Administration. Approximately 40 of Elian’s management team and key employees are re-investing £26m of proceeds into Intertrust shares.

Commenting on the transaction, Paul Willing, CEO of Elian said: “Our combined service offering and network of offices globally will broaden and strengthen our capabilities to support our clients in all key international business locations. We know Intertrust shares our belief that our people are our most valuable asset. The opportunities for career development, as well as the leadership and international mobility programs will make our tie-up with Intertrust especially interesting for our employees. We are truly creating the global leader in our industry with this transaction – very exciting.”

The Ogier team included partners Matthew Shaxson and Raulin Amy in Jersey and Frances Watson in Guernsey.

The head of Ogier’s private client and trusts team, Sally Edwards, will  be speaking at the Europa Institute’s Zürcher Stiftungsrechtstag conference at the University of Zurich on 17 June 2016.

With an audience of private client practitioners, Sally will discuss the new offshore foundations and their impact on the international planning environment.

Sally is a renowned trusts expert known as the ‘go to’ trust lawyer in Jersey. Sally has recently been shortlisted for IFLR European Women in Business Law award and is recognised as an expert in the Citywealth Leaders List and the Citywealth IFC Power Women Top 200.

Upcoming is the 10-year anniversary of the age discrimination regulations in the UK, the possibility of a Brexit from the European laws forming the basis of that legislation and fundamental changes to the UK pensions savings and retirement system.

In this ALL ABOUT AGE webinar Gowling’s HR law experts will again look at a number of issues, updates and forecasts relating to AGE in 2016, including:

• 10-years on from the introduction of the age discrimination regulations in the UK – a reminder of where we started, and where we are now
• the Brexit and AGE: in or out, what could be the consequences for our age discrimination laws in the UK
• an update on the recent AGE decisions in Donkor v Royal Bank of Scotlandand Dove v Brown & Newirth Ltd

Intellectual Asset Management (IAM) has recognized Gowling WLG as one of the world’s leading patent firms in the 2016 edition of IAM Patent 1000 – The World’s Leading Patent Practitioners.

Singled out for its highly regarded patent practices in Canada, the UK, Russia, Germany and China, Gowling WLG was named one of the top international patent firms overall.

Karanović & Nikolić senior associate Katarina Gudurić  attended the 33^rd International Financial Law Conference, recently held by IBA in Athens between 18-20 May. The event was an opportunity for international lawyers with expertise in banking and securities law to (re)connect and exchange views on many hot topics in the area of banking and capital markets.

The attendees were honoured to witness the keynote speech of Mr. Yannis Stournaras, Governor of the Bank of Greece, whose presentation focused on the financial stability in the recent turmoil filled times for Greece.

The conference itself was labelled as a success by many of the attendees, with a variety of important learnings taken away from it. Hopes are high that these expert insights will soon find relevant situations to be applied in, both in national and international contexts.

Mishcon de Reya chief strategy officer Nick West discusses the “incredibly exciting” field of artificial intelligence in The Lawyer’s 60-second interview on key topics from the upcoming Business Leadership Summit.

Why do you think technologies such as AI and predictive coding are apparently gaining momentum in term of their uptake in the UK legal market?

First and foremost, the legal market isn’t an isolated bubble. There is so much happening right now in the world at large about AI and cognitive computing that the legal market simply can’t be immune. Our behaviours in the workplace are driven (and increasingly so) by our experiences in the rest of our lives, so when there’s a constant stream of mainstream news about AI, it’s inevitable that it must impact the legal market.

Add into the mix a number of other legal market factors – the increasing price sensitivity of clients, the explosion in data, the long-standing feeling that there must be a better way to do repetitive knowledge tasks than simply adding more junior lawyers – and you’ve got the perfect conditions for these technologies to take hold.

Do you have any experience of using AI or seeing it in action? Were you impressed?

Yes, absolutely. At Mishcon, TAR (technology assisted review, including predictive coding) has been a key feature of our approach to litigation for several years and with our recent launch of Mishcon Discover (our managed e-Disclosure offering, in partnership with kCura and Unified), it’s now standard practice on most disclosure exercises.

The technology is getting better with every release, particularly concept searching and clustering using latent semantic indexing/analysis type capabilities. There’s no doubt that TAR drives significant savings in speed and cost and, critically, leads to better outcomes for clients.

Outside the litigation arena, we’re also working with a number of AI/cognitive search players on transactional diligence exercises, to increase the speed and efficacy of contract review. One of the biggest benefits I’m seeing of using these new tools is that the data output is very flexible, so there’s a lot that can be done to integrate the data straight into client systems

What sorts of opportunities do they present for legal services providers to be seen to be at the cutting edge of a market or present themselves as forward-thinking or trail blazers?

Yes, the marketing opportunities are there, for sure, but for me, the more important goal is to get work done better and more productively – that’s a boon for our lawyers and our clients.

What do you see as the biggest concerns or risks about using these sorts of technologies?

At a macro level, I don’t really have any.  Clearly, any technology used badly can lead to poor outcomes, so we’re very conscious to ensure that we have sufficient expertise, whether internal or external, to hand when we are working with new technologies. I think it’s also vital for us to test new technologies carefully – there’s often a big gap between the promise and reality – so, we’re careful to pilot things and keep the initial application to limited data before we begin to scale things up.

I’m also very conscious about education – both educating people as to what the technology can and can’t do, and also ensuring that junior lawyers still get sufficient theoretical and practical experience of the underlying legal tasks that we are looking to use the technology for, because in my mind, the winning move is the combination of legal and technology expertise – you need to have a good degree of expertise in a particular legal task to be able to train cognitive technology correctly.

What data exists on how much more accurate AI or predictive coding is than more traditional methods?

There aren’t huge numbers of studies because it’s not an easy task to set up an controlled experiment at statistically relevant scale of human vs technology assisted review, but the work of Grossman and Cormack in the US is worth spending time on – giving quantitative proof that technology assisted review yields better results with less effort and that continuous active learning methods are the best. Grossman and Cormack’s work was heavily cited by Judge Peck in the seminal 2012 US case (Da Silva Moore vs Publicis) in which TAR was first approved.

What do you think the future looks like in terms of the uptake of technologies like AI and predictive coding in the UK and what is that likely to mean for the legal market?

It’s an incredibly exciting field – we’re only just seeing the start of it.

Cravath Swaine & Moore, one of the oldest and most prestigious firms in New York, has raised its starting salary for junior lawyers from $160,000 to $180,000, legal press in America have reported.

Why is this important? Well, in the highly competitive New York market, the top firms compete ferociously for the best young lawyers. Where one firm leads, the rest tend to match.

There hasn’t been a mass pay hike in New York since 2007. For the last nine years, the bulk of top US firms have all paid their starting New York associates $160,000. To offer less is to look cheap. Cravath’s move to $180,000 may well see a bunch of firms follow suit.

Meanwhile in London, a number of US firms pay their newly-qualifieds in the region of £100,000. The reason they give is that they are simply matching what their New York juniors are paid. If salaries in New York rise, those top-paying firms may increase wages in the UK too.

Thy say that when New York sneezes, London catches a cold. Equally, when New York starts splashing the cash, London lawyers might reasonably expect money to flutter across the Atlantic.

DAC Beachcroft has raided DWF’s Newcastle insurance practice for the second time in two months after picking up a four-lawyer professional indemnity (PI) team.

The team includes DWF’s Newcastle office head Helen Ager. Ager is a former president of Newcastle Law Society and was managing partner legacy North East firm Crutes before it was acquired by DWF in 2011.

The four-lawyer team includes partner Tom Whitfield and the lawyers will also be joined by additional professional support staff.

DAC regional senior partner David Weatherburn said: “This latest set of hires comes after a year that saw revenues in our Newcastle office grow by 18 per cent and as we secure an additional 4,000sq ft of space to be fitted out by the end of August.”

Managing partner David Pollitt said the acquisition underlined the firm’s “commitment to prolonged and strategic investment in the north east”.

Last month DAC picked up a six-partner insurance team in Newcastle from DWF. The casualty claims team consisted of 11 fee-earners and is led by DWF’s Newcastle occupational health and casualty team Rod Searl. He was joined by partners David Drewe, Andrea Ward, Sue Howes, Shaun O’Neill and Nicola Hyam. Associate director Mark Douglas was made up to partner as part of the deal.

The group acts for general insurers with specific public sector and major corporate expertise in personal injury, abuse and fraud.

Bates Wells Braithwaite is delighted to announce the appointment of new partner Gillian Roche-Saunders.

Gillian will lead the firm’s new financial regulation consultancy service,