Charles Russell and Speechly Bircham merged on 1 November to create Charles Russell Speechlys.
The new firm has 170 partners, a total of 500 lawyers and revenues of GBP135m.
The partners of both Speechly Bircham and Charles Russell voted overwhelmingly in favour of the merger in July this year. The combination creates a top 30 UK law firm that combines a private wealth practice with a significant business law capability.
The firm provides advisory, transactional, regulatory and contentious services to major corporates, privately-owned businesses and wealthy individuals. It has significant strength in the real estate and construction sectors, transactional expertise across the financial services sector, and specialist employment, intellectual property and commercial teams advising in sectors such as healthcare, retail, leisure, sport and TMT.
Headquartered in London, the firm has a growing network of offices in some of Europe’s and the Gulf’s main wealth and business centres, as well as long-standing relationships and networks throughout the US, Africa and the Caribbean.
“The size and structure of the integrated firm unlocks significant opportunities for our clients and for our staff,” says James Carter, Charles Russell Speechlys’ managing partner. “Partners from both firms had the desire to create the market-leading firm providing business law and private wealth advice internationally. The creation of Charles Russell Speechlys takes us a long way towards meeting that shared and now very achievable objective.”
“This is a significant and exciting development for two firms that can both trace their heritage back for well over 100 years,” says Christopher Page, Charles Russell Speechlys’ senior partner. “We believe that the combination enables us to offer clients an integrated approach with greater depth of expertise and to continue our long traditions of delivering first-class client service combined with trusted legal insight and sophisticated commercial awareness.”
