Defence giant names new legal panel after first review in a decade

Aerospace and defence giant BAE Systems has completed the first major review of its external legal advisers in the UK for more than a decade, with law firms including Allen & Overy (A&O) and Linklaters among those making the grade.

The review, which kicked off last summer under the leadership of chief UK counsel Roger Wiltshire, has seen the company formalise its relationship with 16 law firms as well as three sets of barristers chambers.

All of the firms will sit on the preferred adviser roster until spring 2011, when their performance will be reviewed again.

BAE declined to provide a full list of the firms on the roster but confirmed that A&O, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Linklaters, Slaughter and May, Addleshaw Goddard, Pinsent Masons and Blake Lapthorn were among the firms winning places. Eversheds is also understood to have been appointed, with the remaining firms a mix of City, regional and niche players.

The preferred adviser list also counts a general commercial set, a specialist construction set and a public law set.

The review saw BAE emphasising value-added services from advisers, with firms' ability to help with training, knowledge management and the secondment of lawyers a key factor in ongoing relationships. Billing models have also come under scrutiny, with firms instructed to provide more information on transactions in order to facilitate greater use of alternative fee arrangements in the future.

Wiltshire told Legal Week: "The law firm review was not about dropping established relationships but rather establishing a new basis for our relationships with external counsel going forward. We now have a non-exclusive preferred set of law firms which enables us to use other firms where necessary."

BAE, which does business in more than 100 countries worldwide, is embarking on a review of its non-US and non-UK international legal advisers, with the intention of concentrating work with a smaller number of firms.