The boss of one of the London’s elite insurance law firms has taken the extraordinary step of personally overseeing misconduct complaints after rising allegations of bullying and sexual harassment among senior partners, shining a fresh, unflattering light on law firms’ ongoing struggle to clean up their cultures.
Read more . .
London Law Boss ‘Spitting Feathers’ Over Partners’ Sexual Harassment Pattern Read More »
In the rarefied atmosphere where partners measure success in eight-figure payouts and associates measure it in how many weekends they haven’t seen since the bar exam, one number looms above all others: profit per equity partner, or PEP.
PEP is the metric that makes managing partners beam, headhunters salivate, and mid-level associates stare at their billable hour trackers with a particular brand of existential dread.
The 2026 Am Law 100 rankings — reflecting 2025 fiscal performance — haven’t been formally published yet. But early reports are already in, and if you thought the 2025 numbers were eye-watering, with 4.6 trillion (that’s ‘illion’ with a ‘T’) brace yourself.
Kirkland & Ellis has become the first law firm in history to crack $10 billion in annual revenue, posting $10.56 billion for 2025 — up 20% year-on-year.
PEP at the Chicago colossus hit $11.1 million, also up approximately 20%. Since 2020, Kirkland’s average partner profits have risen 80%. Let that arithmetic sink in for a moment. A Kirkland equity partner today earns roughly what a senior Magic Circle partner in London earns in four years.
The PEP-Talk Numbers
In a bold lateral strike that underscores the fierce talent battle in Paris Big Law, Ropes & Gray has snapped up a high-powered eight-lawyer private equity and M&A group from rival Latham & Watkins.
The move, confirmed by multiple sources including The Lawyer andLaw.com International, brings three partners — Denis Criton, (pictured) Gaëtan Gianasso, and Michael Colle
Ropes & Gray Raids Latham & Watkins for Eight-Lawyer Paris PE/M&A Team Read More »
Prominent Kirkland & Ellis litigator Jay Lefkowitz, the man who led the charge to lock in Jeffrey Epstein’s notorious 2008 Florida non-prosecution agreement, is retiring from the firm after more than 30 years at the powerhouse firm. Lefkowitz, a Columbia Law School grad, Bush White House alum, and longtime senior litigation partner (who also sat
Jay Lefkowitz, Kirkland Partner Who Represented Epstein, to Retire from Firm This Spring Read More »
White & Case has delivered another record-breaking year, posting an 8.5% revenue increase for 2025 to reach $3.6 billion Legal Business — and signalling loudly that this is very much a firm still in growth mode. Profits per equity partner hit an all-time high of $4.41 million, a 10% jump that will keep the partnership
White & Case Hits $3.6bn — And It’s Just Getting Warmed Up Read More »
Kirkland & Ellis just changed the frame for the entire industry
If you write about lawyers for long enough, you make a quiet peace with the gap between your pay packet and theirs. This week, however, Kirkland & Ellis has made that gap feel almost cosmic.
Equity partners at the world’s highest-grossing law firm averaged $11.1 million each for 2025 – a 20% increase on 2024. The major money figure places Kirkland’s partners in the earnings bracket of a top Premier League footballer, at roughly £22,500 a day.
The firm simultaneously became the first law firm in history to break $10 billion in revenue, posting $10.56 billion for the year.
When Weil, Gotshal & Manges announced last week that Ramona Y. Nee will succeed Barry Wolf as Executive Partner from January 2027, the news landed with the quiet inevitability of a deal that everyone saw coming.
Wolf, who has steered the firm for 16 years, called her “uniquely suited.” He was not exaggerating. For nearly a quarter-century Nee has been the quiet engine of Weil’s U.S. private equity practice and the beating heart of its Boston office. Now the firm is handing her the keys.
The Private Equity Lawyer Who Will Run Weil Gotshal Read More »
The legal profession has survived recessions, regulatory upheavals and the occasional partner meltdown. But the next threat to BigLaw’s favourite revenue model may come from something far less dramatic.
A machine that reads faster than any associate and which could spell the end of the infamous ‘billable hour’, which has been touted as being in its end time for some time.
According to Jeff Bleich, general counsel at AI company Anthropic, (pictured) the traditional billable hour could soon be on borrowed time.
Is This The Billable Hour’s Last Stand? Anthropic’s Top Lawyer Thinks So Read More »
Updated 16 March with clarification on the DLAPiper profit pool arrangements following the restructuring. For years, the Swiss verein has been BigLaw’s favourite legal fiction as a neat way for sprawling global firms to present as “one firm” while keeping the money, liabilities and politics carefully ring‑fenced by region. Now DLA Piper, is preparing to
DLA Piper Makes A Big Bet By Ditching the Verein for a New Global Structure Read More »
A two‑year‑old Swedish startup has just become one of the most valuable legal tech businesses on the planet—and it is using that war chest to plant its flag squarely in the US legal market. Legora’s $550 million Series D at a $5.55 billion valuation is not just another exuberant AI round; it is a blunt message to law firm leaders that the window for treating AI as a side project has closed.
Legora’s pitch is disarmingly simple. Built on top of large language models, its platform targets the work that eats most of a junior lawyer’s life: research, document review, contract drafting and due diligence.
The company claims tens of thousands of legal professionals using the product daily, across some 800 customers in more than 50 markets, including heavy‑hitting firms like Bird & Bird, Cleary Gottlieb, White & Case, Linklaters, Goodwin, Dentons and advisers such as Deloitte.
Billable Hours vs. Billion‑Dollar Bots – Legora and the New Economics of Law Read More »
