Lawyers on Demand, an alternative legal services provider serving the in-house sector, is to be acquired by Consilio, a US-based legal tech and services business.

Consilio is also acquiring SYKE, a legal technology consultancy with which LOD joined forces in 2021.

LOD was created in 2007 by Simon Harper, a partner at Berwin Leighton Paisner, and Jonathan Brenner, then the firm’s head of recruitment. It was later spun out of the law firm (BCLP no longer has a stake) and claims to have since built a community of over 4,500 legal practitioners providing clients with on-demand expertise. These include lawyers, legal engineers, legal operations consultants, paralegals, and risk and compliance professionals.

Consilio said the acquisition would expand its UK business and extend its Enterprise Legal Services operations to Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia and Australia. LOD’s clients are said to include 27 members of the FTSE 100 and 54 members of the ASX 200.

Simon Harper

Harper: 'Excited about our shared culture'

Andy Macdonald, Consilio’s chief executive, said: ‘The flexible talent market remains fragmented and we continue to explore opportunities to create impactful solutions for legal teams as they face an unprecedented amount of talent concerns, as a result of historically high attrition rates, budgetary freezes, and legal industry salary increases out of reach for many corporations.

‘This acquisition brings LOD’s and SYKE’s deep expertise in flexible legal talent and legal technology consulting onboard while unlocking greater scale and capabilities for our clients.’

Harper said: ‘Consilio has a history of bringing very strategic acquisitions into its fold to become the global leader in legal consulting and services, as well as the world’s largest eDiscovery provider. We’re excited about our shared culture and the vision for what we can offer together to global legal teams.’

On completion of the acquisition UK private equity firm Bowmark Capital will realise its five-year investment in LOD and SYKE – ‘a period defined by considerable growth’, the businesses said.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

 

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