Financial Times Innovative Lawyers report for Europe 2024
The FT Innovative Lawyers report for Europe was published on 13 September 2024.
Lawyers have shown again how they can be leaders in society and business, flexing their muscles to help revive the city of London, battle crypto fraudsters, direct funding towards African nations and raise the level of debate around climate change through artful litigation. At the same time generative AI is being adopted in cautious but decisive ways both in-house and at law firms. See the full report here.
A&O Shearman and KPMG Abogados took home the big awards in London on 13 September at a sold-out awards event in the Natural History Museum.
The in-house legal team at Unilever also won big with the award for most innovative legal team.
Among the themes of the report is a clear message that talent management in law firms is finally changing, recognising the value that people can bring from unconventional backgrounds and skillsets beyond traditional legal work.
We had a number of extraordinary examples of innovation in legal practice from tackling a fraudster claiming to have invented bitcoin, to designing new funding models for African countries. We spoke to lawyers in Ukraine finding ways to get their economy ready for EU membership. We also saw how mass claims litigation is making its mark on the European legal landscape, helped by technology and new business models.
We took a close look at how lawyers are using their skills and resources to take climate change to court, tackling states and corporations to make them recognise the tangible risks of not taking action on carbon emissions and other damaging side effects of doing business.
INNOVATIVE PRACTITIONER Marion Palmer, Hogan Lovells
INNOVATIVE LEGAL INTRAPRENEUR Idoya Fernández, Cuatrecasas
MOST INNOVATIVE LAW FIRM IN EUROPE A&O Shearman
MOST INNOVATIVE LAW FIRM IN EUROPE (HEADQUARTERED IN EUROPE OUTSIDE UK) KPMG Abogados
PRO BONO Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer
SUSTAINABILITY AND ESG Linklaters
DEALS AND FINANCING Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer
DISPUTE RESOLUTION Mishcon de Reya
PRIVATE CAPITAL Ropes & Gray
RESTRUCTURING Weil, Gotshal & Manges and White & Case
TECHNOLOGY SECTOR Bird & Bird
UNLOCKING FINANCE White & Case
GENERATIVE AI TOOLS A&O Shearman
GENERATIVE AI STRATEGY DLA Piper
NEW LEGAL PRODUCTS CMS
REGULATORY SOLUTIONS Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer
IMPROVING CLIENT EXPERIENCE Ashurst
DATA-ENHANCED KNOWLEDGE Herbert Smith Freehills
LAW FIRM STRATEGY Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison
TALENT MANAGEMENT Cuatrecasas
SKILLS DEVELOPMENT Garrigues
Read more about the Practice of Law and Business of law submissions
MOST INNOVATIVE IN-HOUSE LEGAL TEAM IN EUROPE Unilever
LEGAL TEAM: USING GENERATIVE AI Unilever
LEGAL TEAM: COMMERCIAL AND STRATEGIC ADVICE Vodafone
LEGAL TEAM: SUSTAINABILITY AND IMPACT Greenpeace International
LEGAL TEAM: NEW PRODUCTS AND SERVICES Cariad (VW)
LEGAL TEAM: OPERATIONAL TRANSFORMATION Iberdrola
LEGAL TEAM: OUTSIDE COUNSEL MANAGEMENT HSBC
LEGAL TEAM: PEOPLE AND SKILLS Zurich Insurance Group
Read more about the case studies here