Herbert Smith is in line for a fees windfall after scoring a major role advising on one of the UK's biggest private finance schemes to date.

Herbert Smith corporate partner Paul Ryan is advising Metrix, a joint venture between former state-owned military research body Qinetiq and property outsourcing group Land Securities Trillium, on a £16bn training contract with the Ministry of Defence (MoD).

Under the deal, Metrix will provide all the UK armed forces with non-military training – such as engineering, logistics and security – in a 25-year private finance initiative (PFI) scheme known as the Defence Training Review.

The MoD started negotiations with a number of parties to overhaul its existing training system of the armed forces in 2004.

Metrix has been awarded the contract for package one, which involves the provision of training for engineering and communications, and has provisionally been awarded the contract for package two, which covers training for logistics, security, policing and administration.
Metrix beat a consortium known as MC3, which included aerospace and defence company BAE Systems and defence contractor VT Group, to the mandate.

Herbert Smith has a longstanding relationship with Qinetiq, having advised on its split from the MoD and subsequent initial public offering last year. The research body also instructed Herbert Smith when buy-out house Candover took a 31% stake in 2003. The firm has also done a significant amount of work for Land Securities.

The Defence Training Review will operate national 'centres of excellence' and will create a tri-service defence training campus at St Athan in the Vale of Glamorgan. The programme is expected to affect around 3,400 military and 3,000 civilian instructors and support personnel, plus about 11,000 defence trainees.

It will reduce the number of training sites in the country from about 30 to around 10. There will be a five-year transition period starting in the latter part of 2008.

Simmons & Simmons finance partner David Nelligan and projects partner Juliet Reingold advised the MOD. Simmons instruction predates its removal from the MoD panel in January 2006.