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  • November 26, 2009 |

    Leading firms act on largest UK pre-pack deal for Wind Hellas

    A raft of UK and US firms, including White & Case, Bingham McCutchen, Allen & Overy (A&O) and Slaughter and May, are advising on the UK's largest ever pre-pack administration. Wind Hellas, one of Greece's largest mobile phone operators, filed for administration with the English High Court earlier this month, with parent company Weather Investments set to rescue the business.

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  • November 25, 2009 |

    Quinn Emanuel raises stakes in Lehman-Barclays dispute

    The official creditors committee in the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy fired the latest shot on Tuesday (24 November) in the dispute between Lehman and Barclays over whether Barclays received an improper 'windfall' in its purchase of Lehman's North American assets and liabilities last September. The dispute has been brewing for months and has resulted in several motions for discovery and at least three lawsuits. In short: Lehman, its creditors and the trustee of its estate allege that certain higher-ups at both Lehman and Barclays arranged - without the knowledge of Lehman's counsel at Weil Gotshal & Manges - to sell most of Lehman's North American assets to Barclays in late September 2008 under terms that were far too favourable to the buyer.

    1 minute read

  • November 18, 2009 |

    Jones Day leads as Lehman files suit against Barclays over $5bn 'windfall'

    Jones Day has won a lead role on the latest lawsuit to arise from the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers. Lehman Brothers Holdings has filed suit against Barclays, claiming the bank received an undeserved windfall of at least $5bn (£3bn) when it purchased much of Lehman's North American operations after Lehman's collapse last September.

    1 minute read

  • November 13, 2009 |

    Jones Day demotes five London partners to of counsel rank

    Jones Day has demoted a number of London partners over the last year, with five former partners now serving as of counsel at the firm. The demotions, first reported on legal blog RollOnFriday, equate to nearly 10% of the US firm's London partnership, which currently lists 48 partners on its website. The office also lists 16 of counsel and one counsel, in addition to assistants.

    1 minute read

  • November 11, 2009 |

    US Briefing: Mayer without Maher

    In the seven years after Paul Maher helped wed his firm, London's Rowe & Maw, to Chicago-based Mayer Brown & Platt, he established a reputation as the firm's best strategist. He pushed his partners to open a Hong Kong office, which was later used to open the door to a merger with Johnson Stokes & Master, a Hong Kong firm with 300 lawyers in Asia. As vice-chairman, he argued for strengthening Mayer Brown's wilting New York office - a perpetual work-in-progress - and for boosting profitability, which has sagged in recent years.

    1 minute read

  • November 11, 2009 |

    More than just price

    "A typical energy project is complex, unpredictable and chaotic," says Peter Roberts, general counsel of Centrica Energy, the upstream business of Centrica. "So attempting to tie a law firm to a fixed fee is an unintelligent way of proceeding." Still, Roberts expects any law firm advising on one of the oil and gas, wind or early phase nuclear power projects Centrica is currently developing to be able to at least provide a cost estimate - even if they end up straying from it: "It's like asking a cabbie how much he reckons it will cost to get to King's Cross," he says. "If he can't at least give you a rough estimate then there is a strong suggestion that he doesn't know what he is doing."

    1 minute read

  • November 6, 2009 |

    Law professor withdraws legal blog lawsuit

    A law school professor has withdrawn a lawsuit accusing the legal blog Above the Law of publishing a "viciously racist series of rants" after reporting the professor's arrest for suspicion of soliciting prostitution, writes The National Law Journal. University of Miami School of Law professor Donald Marvin Jones dropped his lawsuit against the popular US blog on Wednesday (4 November), nine days after he filed it pro se in the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida.

    1 minute read

  • November 3, 2009 |

    Law professor sues legal blog for $22m in damages

    A prominent law professor has launched a claim against Above the Law, alleging the popular US legal blog of racially taunting him in a series of posts, writes the National Law Journal. The case involves coverage of a prominent University of Miami School of Law professor and civil rights advocate Donald Marvin Jones, who was arrested on suspicion of soliciting an undercover officer for sex.

    1 minute read

  • October 28, 2009 |

    Bourgeois revolution

    Earlier this year, Forbes magazine named General Electric (GE) as the largest company in the world in its annual Global 2000 list. GE employs 323,000 people globally (among them over 1,000 lawyers) across a range of businesses including electronics, healthcare and financial services. So when it comes to reviews of external legal advisers at the company, the processes involved are complex and lengthy: 18 months, in this case.

    1 minute read

  • October 19, 2009 |

    Weil Gotshal tops list of earners as Lehman bankruptcy fees near $200m

    The sum total of legal fees for work relating to the collapse of Lehman Brothers is rapidly approaching $200m, according to Securities and Exchange Commission records. The ten law firms (plus an individual lawyer in the UK) involved in Lehman's Chapter 11 case have billed the Lehman estate a total of $178.8m (£110m) since the company filed for bankruptcy on 15 September last year.

    1 minute read