Legacy Dundas & Wilson partners are undergoing their first partnership remuneration review at CMS Cameron McKenna (CMS UK) as the two-year lock-in period agreed to when the firms merged comes to an end.

Legal Week revealed the lock-in plans in December 2013 prior to the £270m merger between the UK arm of international firm CMS and Scottish firm Dundas & Wilson going live.

The lock-in period is due to end at the start of next month.

At the time of the merger all of Dundas' partners joined CMS' two-tier partnership structure. The last time CMS' partnership structure was reviewed and changed was in May 2013. The system was overhauled and divided into full-equity and fixed-share ranks, with the intention of speeding up progression for junior partners.

The firm also changed aspects of its full equity lockstep to allow junior partners to progress more rapidly through the pay ladder on one hand while, on the other, increasing management's ability to hold the progression of more senior partners depending on performance.

In 2014-15 CMS reported a 24% turnover boost following the merger, growing to £262.9m including its share of joint ventures' turnover. Of that, Dundas' contribution accounted for £47m.

A sum of £2.6m was spent on reorganising, restructuring and integrating the two firms following the merger, which took effect from May 2014.

Profit available for division among members rose by 35% from £45.7m to £61.5m, while group operating profit rose from £60.6m to £78.7m.

In February, the firm elected the joint head of its Scottish practice Stephen Millar as the firm's new UK managing partner.

Millar will begin his four-year term at the beginning of May when current post-holder Duncan Weston steps down after two terms in the role.

Speaking to Legal Week, Weston, who will join CMS' board in a new role as executive partner for global development from 1 May, laid out the firm's plans to create a US footprint.

He said: "The US initiative has been an important priority of the CMS strategy for a long time."

He added: "CMS has subcommittees working on America, Asia and Africa – teams of partners who have spent time developing relationships in these areas."