Two patent attorneys who are being sued by a boutique IP firm for jumping ship to start their own business have cleared the first hurdle in their fight against preliminary discovery, after a judge found the documents relied upon by their former employer’s lawyers at Seyfarth Shaw were relevant to the case.
The federal Attorney-General has unveiled a new system for the allocation of more than $1 billion in external legal services to the Commonwealth government over the next five years, with just two Australian law firms approved in every practice area.
Coal producer Glencore International has lost its High Court appeal to keep the Australian Taxation Office from reviewing documents related to its offshore assets, which were unearthed as part of the global Paradise Papers investigation.
Lawyerly’s inaugural class action report shows one plaintiffs firm dominating the field, running more than twice the active class actions as its nearest rivals. But a group of capable and ambitious firms are nipping at its heels.
Many commercial dispute resolution groups in Australia are getting a boost from class action defence work, as more parties get dragged into increasingly complex representative proceedings. But the Big Six firms are still the ones companies turn to the most when staring down a class action.
Eleven law firms reign supreme in the legal market for class actions in Australia, with ten or more class actions on their plates, and two firms are way ahead of the pack, according to Lawyerly’s inaugural ranking of the country’s top class action groups.
Burford Capital has come under fire by a US short-seller which claims the litigation funder has engaged in misleading accounting practices and is a “poor business masquerading as a great one”.
International legal giant Dentons will acquire New Zealand law firm Kensington Swan, a move that will further strengthen its position in the Australasian region.
Former King & Wood Mallesons managing partner Stuart Fuller will take the reins of KPMG’s global legal services division, the first Australian at the helm of the Big Four firm’s legal offering.
The overwhelming majority of employees at small and medium-sized law firms are being affected by depression and anxiety, with a new survey revealing almost one in three work more than 45 hours a week.