National firm Weightmans has revealed ambitions to double in size - potentially with the assistance of private equity - as it seeks to move from the top-40 to top-30 rankings in the legal table.
‘Being in the middle of the league isn’t a good generator of critical mass,’ Sarah Walton, appointed this year as managing partner, told the Gazette. 'If we can say we are the market leader, that’s when clients sit up and take notice.'
The firm, which is approaching its 175th anniversary, has come far from its Liverpool roots, she said. Insurance, its traditional base, now accounts for just a quarter of turnover, alongside niches public sector work - where the firm claims a market lead police forces - and suporting the multiple needs of owner-managed businesses.
‘We’re a really diverse firm, we’ve been diversifying since 2005,’ Walton said. ‘It makes us resilient.’ Long term public sector contracts act as anchor tenants to enable agility elsewhere, she said.
The £160 million turnover firm now has 1,700 people (267 partners) working in 10 offices, of which London is now the biggest by number of fee earners. As well as improving visibility with clients, expansion will help investment in new technology. 'The really exciting bit is gen AI and what you can do with it. Clients will demand it,' she said. 'We’re piloting lots of things, we’re slowly and steadily rolling CoPilot out. Everybody should learn how to use it, but to use it with their own knowledge, rather than cheating.'
To build the firm, Walton says she is looking out for further mergers, while noting that these do not automatically create economies of scale when regulators require the maintenance of separate back-office structures. In this ambition, she is not ruling out backing from private equity. 'It’s not part of our business plans at the moment, but we can’t close the door to it,' she said, pointing to the investment model’s creep elsewhere in the professional services sector. 'PE is a risk, but also an opportunity. It works in professional services such as accountancy… why shouldn’t it work in law?'
‘The next five years are going see a massive change in the sector.’
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