National firm Addleshaw Booth & Co's London office has moved into profit three years after opening in the City.

This financial year, the firm's City office budgeted to turn over £9.8m by the year-end in April, with overall overheads of £9.7m. The firm is now expecting turnover to exceed £10m.

"When we opened in 1998, we aimed for the London office to be making a contribution to the firm's profits within five years," said managing partner Mark Jones.

The achievement marks an important milestone for Addleshaws, which has been engaged in a heavy investment programme during the past three years after deciding to open its City office.

However, the firm is still far behind its main national rivals in the City, with the more established London offices of DLA, Eversheds and Hammond Suddards Edge all bringing in more than £40m a year.

Addleshaws now has a total of 20 partners and 40 other fee earners based in London out of a total of 127 partners and 460 other fee earners firm wide.

Last autumn the firm moved into larger City offices, taking on a 27,500 sq ft base in Cannon Street to handle projected growth.

"In terms of headcount and turnover, the London office is about 30% the size of the Manchester and Leeds offices," Jones said.

"We had projected turnover of £1.25m in the first year, £2.5m in the second year and £5m in the third year, but we are now making more than twice the amount we expected."

Addleshaws aims to have three national offices of roughly equal size by 2008 and the firm has made no secret of its aim to bolster its London office through a merger.