Litigation
For the forthcoming UK research round, Chambers has said that you will no longer need to provide a submission for the London: Litigation section – one of the largest and most competitive sections in the guide.
Instead, Chambers will invite submissions for “London: Corporate & Commercial Litigation”, a new section which is more narrowly focused on commercial disputes between private companies, post-M&A disputes, joint venture disputes and shareholder disputes.
Other broader areas of litigation, which are covered elsewhere in various specialist Chambers sections (regulatory investigations, competition law, administrative and public law, local government, crime etc…) will not be considered under this chapter.
Rather, Chambers will draw up its litigation rankings based on its research and submissions for those existing areas in the guide.
Speaking to editor Michael Perkin (pictured), Chambers hopes this will streamline what had become a rather unwieldy section, and expects that it will save firms time by not having to repeat a lot of the work they have already provided for the more specialized sections.
International Arbitration
The international arbitration section will now be sub-divided into “investor-state” and “commercial arbitration”, with separate tables for each.
Most City arbitration practices do a mixture of the two areas, with some firms weighted more in one direction than the other.
Firms have the option of providing a single submission covering both areas, or if they have a decent amount of work in both, can provide two separate entries.
In making this move, Chambers recognizes the increasing prevalence of investor-state disputes, and clarifies what had been a confusing area for some firms, since in recent years Chambers had seemed to consider investor-state work more for the public international law section than the international arbitration section.
The full definitions for all the international arbitration sections are here.
Private Client
Mirroring what happened for the first time this year in Chambers USA, the UK team at Chambers will transition private client-related sections from the main directory into the new sister product, Chambers High Net Worth.
According to Michael Perkin:
“We will incorporate our private client research and rankings into Chambers High Net Worth. Currently there are no submission deadlines posted for private client but we will be in touch with firms shortly to confirm submission deadlines. Submissions will not be due until 2017, with the deadline dates to be confirmed.”
2016-17 Research
The latest Chambers UK guide was released online on Wednesday, November 2 2016, following the launch event on Tuesday, November 1 2016.
The first set of deadlines for latest round of UK research is December 14 2016, and the full schedule is here.
Pictured (top): Chambers UK 2017 launch party at the Waldorf-Hilton in London on November 1 2016 (courtesy of @chambersguides)
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