The Magic Circle, a term historically referring to a select group of premier UK-founded law firms, has seen its glow diminish in recent years due to competition from larger, higher-profit US firms. This shift is bound to become more prominent as the merger between Allen & Overy and Wall Street firm Shearman & Sterling pushes forward. This fusion, fittingly given the moniker ‘A&O Shearman,’ births a corporate titan boasting around 3,900 attorneys with a combined gross revenue of $3.5 billion. Learn more about this merger.
The repercussions of A&O Shearman’s merger underline the varying strategies the remaining four firms – Clifford Chance, Freshfields, Linklaters, and Slaughter & May, are adopting to maintain their elite status, catapulting themselves from their UK-centric origins. This direction points toward the expansion into the US, the world’s largest legal market.
Freshfields’ US Managing Partner, Sarah Solum, stated that the firm’s US expansion has been highly beneficial for their clients, citing the firm’s frequent appearance among the leaders for US and global deal work. While their counterparts refrained from commenting on their US strategies post-merger, Freshfields continues to apply their cross-disciplinary approach within litigation, regulatory, and corporate work across the US, along with several other geographic areas.
The article delves into the idiosyncratic approaches of the other three magic circle firms in the wake of competition and mergers. These strategies include aggressive US expansion by Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Clifford Chance opening its third office in the US, and Linklaters making a bold statement by hiring former global co-managing partner of Shearman & Sterling. However, Slaughter & May has taken an alternate route, opting against hiring US lawyers and focusing instead on utilizing a ‘best friends’ network for client referrals.
Click here to read the full story on the impact of A&O Shearman’s merger on the UK’s magic circle.