Alex Aldridge

May 26, 2010 | International Edition

On Tuesday 4 May at 7:30am a car arrived to pick up former Lovells Beijing managing partner Robert Lewis from his house in the Shunyi district of the Chinese capital, a part of town popular with expats. As it weaved its way off the estate and onto the traffic-choked main road leading to the city centre, Lewis thought about what lay ahead for him at AllBright Law Offices, the Chinese law firm where he was about to start his first day's work. His decision to join the firm, where his brief is to overhaul AllBright's structure and expand its Beijing office to match its market-leading offering in Shanghai, is one Lewis has been edging towards for years now, and he maintains it is unrelated to Lovells' recently concluded merger with US firm Hogan & Hartson.

By Alex Aldridge

24 minute read

May 19, 2010 | International Edition

While most companies have spent the recession battening down the hatches, the Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC) has been in expansion mode. Last month the FTSE 100 natural resources company, whose main assets are located in Kazakhstan, underlined its intentions to go global by purchasing a 12% stake in Northern Platinum, a South African platinum company. The move follows ENRC's acquisition last year of Camec, a copper and cobalt producer in the Democratic Republic of Congo, for £584m and prior purchase of 50% stakes in Brazil's BML iron ore project and the Xinjiang Tuoli Taihang Ferro-Alloy ferrochrome operations in China.

By Alex Aldridge

5 minute read

May 12, 2010 | International Edition

It's the first day of the Legal Practice Course (LPC) at BPP Law School's Holborn branch. To break the ice, the tutor suggests that each person tells everyone else what they did over the summer. Cue the usual tales of vacation schemes and exotic holidays. Finally, it's the turn of the scruffy older guy in the corner. "I did some gigs in Hyde Park, then headlined Glastonbury." "A few people thought I was joking at first," explains Dave Rowntree, LPC student and drummer in the band Blur. "But they googled me and found out I was telling the truth. Not that it was a big deal - after a day it was obvious I wasn't going to turn up in a diamond-encrusted Rolls Royce and laud it over everyone. I'm serious about the law and love learning."

By Alex Aldridge

6 minute read

May 10, 2010 | International Edition

Coventry University is launching a new postgraduate certificate in sports law. The one-year programme will run for the first time from October 2010, and will be delivered at Coventry University's new London campus located in East India House in the City of London. The course, which will cost around £3,000, is open to anyone with an LLB or GDL qualification or to non-legally qualified individuals with significant experience in the sports world.

By Alex Aldridge

2 minute read

May 05, 2010 | International Edition

Recovery was the buzzword at last month's Legal Week Private Equity Forum; recovery, that is, from a low level and in an environment clouded by credit shortages and regulatory uncertainty. "It's looking a bit brighter, but it's not anywhere close to the situation three years ago," said Stephan Grillmaier, a partner at private equity advisers MVision, speaking at the event, held at the Chancery Court Hotel in Holborn, central London.

By Alex Aldridge

5 minute read

April 28, 2010 | International Edition

In December last year, energy company Aggreko joined the heavyweights of the stock market, entering the FTSE 100 for the first time following an 18% rise in its share price. For the company's director of legal affairs, Peter Kennerley, who joined from Scottish & Newcastle in October 2008, it feels good to be back. "When I was in the process of moving from Scottish & Newcastle [a FTSE 100 company until it was de-listed following its takeover by Heineken and Carlsberg in April 2008], my chief executive, Rupert Soames, joked that if I came on board he'd guarantee we would get into the FTSE 100. So it looks like he's fulfilled that side of the bargain," he says.

By Alex Aldridge

5 minute read

April 21, 2010 | International Edition

Once, life was simple in the media business. Media companies produced content - though they didn't call it that - for the masses. Film studios, record companies, publishers and broadcasting groups either owned or had significant control over distribution channels for that content. Life was also much simpler for media lawyers. Work was filled with low-level litigation, turning out fairly standard copyright agreements and, if you worked for one of the acquisitive media conglomerates, bringing in external counsel for intermittent bouts of empire building

By Alex Aldridge

27 minute read

March 25, 2010 | International Edition

BT has sealed a deal to send basic legal tasks to outsourcing provider UnitedLex, spelling the end of its in-house legal support services team in India. From 1 April, a 15-strong UnitedLex team (including lawyers, project managers and online support and administrative staff) will handle commercial contracting and antitrust regulation work for BT's offices in the UK, the US, India, Singapore and Hong Kong. The team will be based in Gurgaon, India.

By Alex Aldridge

2 minute read

March 24, 2010 | International Edition

During the 1640s, lawyers in Virginia were paid in pounds of tobacco - a way of working that would continue to suit British American Tobacco (BAT) quite nicely, jokes the company's general counsel, Neil Withington. But resigned to the likely failure of resurrecting such a payment method, Withington is instead focusing on the rather more 21st century concept of legal process outsourcing as he bids to keep BAT's external legal spend as tight as possible.

By Alex Aldridge

6 minute read

March 24, 2010 | International Edition

Herbert Smith has added two new partners to its energy practice with a double hire from Linklaters. Martin Kavanagh and Matthew Job are set to join the partnership in Herbert Smith's London energy finance team in early summer from their current roles as counsel at Linklaters.

By Alex Aldridge

2 minute read