Madam, – John McManus’s recent article on competition among Irish business law firms brightened my day (Business Opinion, May 10th). The idea that my firm’s competitors might be characterised as vampire squids was as unexpected as it was entertaining. However, I wonder if his analysis of the Irish law firm situation is entirely correct.
As a partner of one the top six law firms I can unhesitatingly say that the level of competition between the leading players is intense and relentless. This manifests itself in hot contests for work commissions, real fee competition and imaginative marketing efforts. It also keeps standards of legal expertise, together with service delivery, at world class levels.
Mr McManus correctly says that particularly of late there have been instances where some firms accepted instructions from quite a variety of parties in what appear to be related matters. As he points out, this is not illegal; furthermore provided appropriate internal Chinese wall type structures are operated, no question of impropriety can be imputed. In a free professional market it is up to the client to choose its lawyer, and if the client is prepared to live with a multiple-instruction situation, it’s hard to say that such commercial judgment should be regulated away. Some clients do not accept Chinese walls and instruct firms accordingly.
Mr McManus referred to six main Dublin firms. In addition to these, I can identify four or five other firms which give a fairly complete business law service, albeit on a smaller scale. So in Ireland we have perhaps 10 business law firms, serving a population of 4.5 million people. I believe that is about the correct number of such firms for a country of Ireland’s size.
It’s interesting to consider the number of foreign or international firms with a Dublin presence. There are just two. If there were a genuine requirement for more business law firms here, it is certain that some of the big international players would have opened here by now.
Firms like DLA Piper, Jones Day or Morgan Lewis Bockius have offices in the most far-flung parts of the world. If there were a real market need in Ireland, or a prospect of profit, they would certainly be here by now. Look at other European cities. Frankfurt has about 20 non-German firms. Milan has over 20 non-Italian firms. Paris has over 30 non-French firms. Why in Ireland have we just two? I think simply because, the Irish market doesn’t warrant more entrants and the international firms judge the market as intensely competitive and already well served in terms of quality.
Despite all this, Mr McManus makes interesting observations. Buyers of legal services here probably need to stretch their instructions over a greater variety of the Dublin business law firms. At the moment they are probably too conservative, and too concentrated in their choices.
There is, for example, massive expertise outside the top three or four firms.
And finally, it is great to know that we have vampire squids in our midst! Thanks to Mr McManus we now have a new ichthyological perspective on the Irish business law community.