Latest News | 22 September 2015
Bondholders Top the Legal 500
Various Bondholder law firms across Derby have received excellent results and commendations in this year's Legal 500 – a guide for legal service buyers.
Bondholders include: Freeths, Smith Partnership, Flint Bishop, Swindell & Pearson, Nelsons Law and Geldards.
Freeths celebrates yet another year of improved rankings and recommendations in the Legal 500 with an astounding 20 top tier rankings and a further 48 rankings for other specialisms across its 11 offices across the UK. Freeths now has over 100 lawyers regarded as 'Elite' in their fields or 'Highly Recommended'.
The firm's East Midlands 'regional heavyweight' status has been retained and top tier rankings include corporate and commercial, real estate, employment and charities.
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“It is great to see us continue to gain and maintain top tier rankings. I believe this truly reflects the dedication of our staff and the commitment they have to providing top class legal advice.”
Mike continues: “As a firm, we have had a busy year with continued growth but looking after and supporting our clients remains at the forefront of our minds.”
Freeths has also been awarded star status by Best Companies for 2015 and is a Sunday Times 100 Best Company to Work for 2015. The new rankings complement the firm’s ‘freethinking’ approach and growth strategy, as they plan to double in turnover by 2020.
Smith Partnership managed to secure rankings in massive fourteen categories as well as a Leading Individual nomination for Muctar Johal who was regarded as “an excellent advocate”.
The Legal 500 mentioned an impressive ten Parnters from Flint Bishop, including: Qamer Ghafoor, Andrew Cochrane, Ian Beardmore, Nick Wells, Beverley Simms, Ran Oren, David Miller, Claire Tonks, Kirpal Bidmead and Claire Rudkin.
Flint's Qamer Ghafoor retained his 'leading individual' status for Litigation along with Senior Partner Andrew Cochrane. Andrew was also given the prestigious title in Licensing law due to his national client base. The two are amongst just a handful in the region to obtain such a title.
Nelsons Solicitors has been recommended as a Top Tier Firm by the Legal 500 in four practice areas – finance (insolvency and corporate recovery), private client (charities and not-for-profit), private client (personal tax, trusts and probate) and real estate (property litigation).
Within those four areas are mentions for Derby partners Simon Waterfield in property litigation and Kevin Modiri in insolvency and corporate recovery. In total the firm was recommended in 20 practice areas including corporate and commercial, human resources and transport.
Bondholder Swindell & Pearson has been flying the flag for Derby as the intellectual property firm was listed amongst the top UK patent and trade mark firms in the 2015 Legal 500 directory.
Finally Geldards received recommendations as a top-tier firm for four practice areas and in an additional 11 practice areas in the East Midlands. The firm also had three lawyers from the East Midlands named in the elite “Leading Lawyers” list.
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“Our acquisition of Robinsons Solicitors in November last year has seen the firm’s presence in the local market go from strength to strength, leading to another year of impressive rankings in the Legal 500.”
David continues: “The firm continues to be recognised as a leader in the fields of corporate, commercial, litigation and property, whilst we’ve significantly enhanced the reputation of our private client and charity teams with the addition of our new colleagues from Robinsons.
“Family law is a new practice area for the firm and we’re delighted to see our team already ranked amongst the best in the region.”
