Lovells has received recognition for the following:
2008
February 2008: Lovells shortlisted in The Times Graduate Recruitment Awards
We have been shortlisted in the top six for the best graduate website in The Times' 11th annual Graduate Recruitment Awards 2008. The firm previously won this award in 2006.
Award: Lovells named as Most Enterprising Law Firm of the Year at The Legal Business Awards 2008
We won the award for Most Enterprising Law Firm of the Year – for the launch of the Sino-Global Legal Alliance (SGLA).
Award: Justin Harness, Head of Knowhow, won the International Knowledge Officer of the Year Award at the third annual Legal Technology Awards 2008.
Justin was recognised for his contribution to the Knowledge Management field through his work at Lovells and, more recently with Barclays, which supported the nomination.
January 2008: Directory rankings: Lovells ranked number one PPP legal adviser in 2007 at the top of Infrastructure Journal's PPP Legal Adviser table, having closed the highest value of PPP deals in 2007.
Infrastructure Journal has reported that Lovells advised on 18 PPP deals with a combined value of US$12 billion (9.5% of market share) between 1 January and 31 December 2007. The projects included the Milan Metro Line project, the Corinth-Tripoli-Kalamata & Leftkro-Sparta Motorway project in Greece, Petrus Land Securities PPP Portfolio refinancing and London Underground Northern Line PPP restructuring.
Award: Lovells named as finalist in RAD Awards 2008
With our recruitment advertising agency Barkers, we were one of three finalists in the 'employer website' category at the 18th annual Recruitment Advertising Awards 2008. .
2007
November 2007:
Rachel Kent named Best Legal Advisor at Compliance Register's Outstanding Service to Compliance and Regulation (OStCaR) Awards 2007
Rachel Kent won the Best Legal Advisor Award in the Regulatory and Commercial category at fourth annual OStCaR Awards 2007. The award, which is divided into two categories – Litigation, Investigation and Enforcement, and Regulatory and Commercial, takes into account the quality of skills, knowledge and compliance standards achieved.
Lovells wins WORLDleaders International IP award for Trademark Excellence
We have received the WORLDeaders International Trademark Excellence award for our work representing the Swedish retailing giant Hennes & Mauritz (H&M) in a dispute against a Russian holder of the H&M trademark in Russia.
The WORLDleaders awards, run by legal publishers Informa Law, are designed to recognise outstanding achievements by IP practitioners.
The Hennes & Mauritz litigation was handled by Moscow consultant Natalia Gulyaeva and associate Konstantin Bochkarev with support of London partner David Latham. We represented H&M at the court of first instance, appeal and cassation appeal within a period of seven months. All courts ruled that the Russian holder had no rights to the H&M trademark
Lovells wins team award in Young Lawyer Pro Bono Awards 2008
We won the team award in the Law Society's ninth annual Young Lawyer Pro Bono Awards for our work with the Action for Blind People Micro Businesses.
Action for Blind People is a Bermondsey-based charity that provides visually impaired people with opportunities for employment within fully functioning small businesses. Since March 2007, trainees Heather Gagen, Edward Mathison, Shrina Shah and Katalina Chin (the latter while on secondment to Lovells from ITV) have helped three visually impaired entrepreneurs to each set up their own business, providing pro bono advice on corporate, employment, property and contractual matters.
Lovells wins Team Award in the Law Society's Young Lawyer Pro Bono Awards
Four Lovells' trainees, Heather Gagen, Shrina Shah, Edward Mathison and Katalina Chin, won the Team Award at the Law Society's ninth annual Young Lawyer Pro Bono Awards for their work with the Action for Blind People Micro Businesses.
November 2007: Lovells wins Dispute Resolution Firm of the Year and Firm of the Year for Junior Staff Development at the Juve Awards
Dispute Resolution Firm of the Year
Juve said that a dynamic generation of young lawyers has closed the gap to the "mahatmas" in the Dispute Resolution practice, Dr Thilo von Bodungen and Dr Volker Triebel. The growth and development of the practice was consistently being pushed, and that development was reflected in the fact that a partner of the younger generation, Dr Detlef Hass, heads the practice.
Firm of the Year for Junior Staff Development
Juve emphasised our senior associate training and the introduction of new career levels. It also said that Lovells is a female-friendly law firm, with the percentage of female associates and female young professionals lying significantly above market average.
Comment: The Awards honour leading commercial law firms in Germany, and are presented on the basis of comprehensive research by Juve, Germany’s leading legal publisher, when compiling the annual "Juve Handbook of Commercial Law Firms".
July 2007: Lovells wins AGR Award for Best Website
News: Lovells has been awarded Best Website at the 2007 annual Association of Graduate Recruiters (AGR) awards, in the category for companies recruiting between 30 and 100 graduates.
Detail: The awards, now in their 19th year, were announced on 10 July at the organisation’s annual conference in Newport, Wales. They recognise and reward graduate recruiters for creative and innovative campaigns that attract the best graduate talent. The awards are unique to the industry in that they are judged independently by students and professional graduate recruiters and are free for members to enter. They are designed to highlight best practice in terms of graduate attraction and to ensure standards within the industry remain high. Winners alongside Lovells in the Best Website categories included Parsons Brinkerhoff (for companies recruiting up to 30 graduates) and Allen & Overy (for companies recruiting over 100 graduates). Dresdner Kleinwort won the overall award.
Comment: Carl Gilleard, chief executive of the AGR, said: “The quality of entries for this year’s awards was once again extremely high, and the judges had a difficult time singling out winners for each category. Attracting the best graduates continues to be competitive, and AGR members are rising to the challenge by demonstrating innovation and creativity in order to stand out from the crowd.”
June 2007: Michael Gallimore ranked as top planning solicitor in England and Wales
News: Planning magazine has named Michael Gallimore as the highest rated individual planning solicitor in their annual survey of leading planning solicitors and barristers. Michael was ranked second in last year's survey. In the ranking of firms, the magazine placed Lovells in third position for planning work, up from sixth position in 2006.
Detail: The survey is compiled by Planning magazine following voting by planning lawyers and planning consultants. Lovells was named as third equal in the firm rankings alongside Denton Wilde Sapte and SJ Berwin. Berwin Leighton Paisner and Eversheds were in first and second place respectively.
Comment: Lovells’ rankings demonstrate our consistently high level of individual and collective talent in this field, and reflects the firm's reputation for top-quality market-leading planning and development work.
June 2007: Lovells recognised in annual FT innovation rankings
News: Lovells has been highly commended in the Financial Times 'Innovation Lawyers Report' for its innovations in human resources and corporate social responsibility ("CSR"). The annual survey of cutting-edge practice in the legal profession was published on 6 July.
Detail: Lovells' Cass business programme and the Lovells Touch campaign were highly commended in the human resources and CSR categories respectively. The firm was also ranked 21st in the Law 50 table of innovative firms in Europe.
The report, sponsored by BDO Stoy Hayward and conducted using research carried out by RSG Consulting, recognises the efforts of law firms in developing new ways of doing business as they strive to win and retain corporate clients in an increasingly competitive market. The rankings are classified as "stand out", "highly commended" and "commended". This year - the second in which the awards have been held - the report assessed innovations from January 2004 to April 2007, and broadened the scope to cover mainland European law firms, in-house lawyers in European companies, lawyers in the UK’s public sector and US law firms operating in Europe.
In addition to the human resources and CSR submissions, Lovells submitted two entries for use of technology (Anchovy and the Graduate Recruitment Website).
Last year, the firm entered six submissions and was recognised in five: public policy pro bono work ('stand out' in CSR category); Anchovy ('stand out' in use of technology); Mexican-Wave ('highly commended' in customer relationships), TransAct and Graduate Recruitment Website (both 'highly commended' in use of technology).
Comment: The report recognises the firm's commitment to pro bono work and people management.
May 2007: Lovells has been recognised for outstanding achievement in Chambers Europe
May 2007: Lovells named world's leading firm for insurance and reinsurance expertise for third consecutive year
News: Lovells has been named global Insurance & Reinsurance Law Firm of the Year in the 2007 Who’s Who Legal Awards. This is the third consecutive time the firm has been recognised, having won the award every year since its inception in 2005.
Detail: Who’s Who Legal lists the leading practitioners in each field, based exclusively on the findings of a six-month independent research process. Ten Lovells partners in three jurisdictions and two US states received sufficient nominations from their clients and peers to be included in the insurance and reinsurance chapter of the publication. Lovells has more practitioners included in the chapter than any other firm. The 10 partners listed are John Young, John Trotter, Peter Taylor, Robin Spencer and John Powell (London); Joe McCullough and Eric Haab (Chicago); David Alberts (New York); and Paolo Ricci and Leah Dunlop (Rome). The winners were formally announced in The International Who’s Who of Business Lawyers 2007, a compendium edition of all the individual Who’s Who Legal publications which was released in April.
Comment: Who’s Who Legal editor in chief Callum Campbell said: “Lovells’ continuing success demonstrates its consistent and unparalleled level of individual and collective talent in this field. We have no hesitation in declaring Lovells the world’s leading firm for insurance and reinsurance expertise."
May 2007: Lovells nominated as Tax Firm of the Year in the 2007 European Tax Awards
News: Lovells has been shortlisted by International Tax Review (ITR) for the Tax Firm of the Year Award for Germany. The awards ceremony will be held in London on 24 May.
Detail: The firm is nominated for its work advising on the €5.416 billion multi-family commercial mortgage-backed securitisation of part of Terra Firma's residential housing portfolio, Deutsche Annington Immobilien. The deal, which completed on 3 August 2006, is the largest ever German commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) issue and remains the largest real estate and private equity transaction in Germany. At the time, it was the largest ever private equity deal in continental Europe. The Anglo-German team was led by head of finance David Hudd, Stephan Geibel (tax structuring), Mark Donald (leveraged finance), Philipp Grzimek (corporate), Katlen Bloecker (finance) and Bernard Kuhn (real estate).
Comment: The award is testament to the firm's reputation in Europe for carrying out high-end market leading work. The achievement is impressive in the light of ITR's comment that it received a far greater number of, and more detailed, submissions from firms than in previous years.
May 2007: Lovells receives client care award from International Law Office
News: We have been identified as an excellent client care provider in Hong Kong by the International Law Office (ILO).
Detail: The ILO Client Choice Awards identify law firms that stand apart for the excellent client care they provide. To select the award winners, the research process focused on law firms’ ability to add real value to their clients’ businesses. The shortlist was generated from an independent ILO subscriber survey of corporate counsel, which received over 1,000 responses, as well as additional research and detailed interviews conducted by an in-house ILO team. Firms were assessed on a number of criteria: quality of legal advice; value for money; commercial awareness; effective communication; billing transparency; tailored fee structures; depth of team; response time; sharing of expertise; and use of technology. Winners were identified for 34 jurisdictions. ILO was launched in 1998 and is one of the leading legal update services for major companies worldwide. It is a key portal through which law firms can communicate with clients.
May 2007: Lovells wins Best Graduate Website award for second consecutive year
News: Lovells won the award for Best Graduate Website for the second consecutive year at the 2007 TARGET National Graduate Recruitment Awards, organised by specialist graduate careers publisher GTI, on 2 May. The firm was also shortlisted as Graduate Employer of the Year and Most Popular Graduate Recruiter in the legal sector.
Detail: The firm fended off competition from Addleshaw Goddard, Allen & Overy, KBC Financial Products, PricewaterhouseCoopers and RBS to win the website award, which was sponsored by the Daily Telegraph. The category is judged by an expert panel comprising representatives from major graduate recruiters, chaired by a leading independent expert. Lovells was nominated alongside IBM UK (the winner), Allen & Overy, Accenture, Barclays, BT, Carillion plc, GlaxoSmithKline, HSBC, JP Morgan, KPMG, McKinsey, Microsoft and Rolls Royce for the Graduate Employer of the Year award. In the Most Popular Graduate Recruiter in Law category, the firm was nominated alongside Allen & Overy (the winner), Clifford Chance, Eversheds, Linklaters and Slaughter & May. These awards were voted for by a student poll of almost 30,000 online votes.
Comment: The award and nominations are a further recognition of the firm's market-leading graduate recruitment efforts. Lovells' nomination as Graduate Employer of the Year - one of only two nominees from the legal sector - is particularly important given that the award is voted for by students and graduates.
March 2007: US Insurer Awards 2007
Lovells has been voted Law Firm of the Year by the readers of this publication.
March 2007: Lovells wins Asia-Pacific Utilities Deal of the Year from Project Finance magazine
Singapore Waste to Energy Project (also known as "the Fifth Incinerator Project") won Utilities Deal of the Year 2006 at the award dinner on 22 March 2007, organised by the Project Finance magazine
March 2007: Lovells wins M&A Deal of the Year at the 2007 IFLR Asian Awards News: Softbank's US$15 billion acquisition of Vodafone Japan won M&A Deal of the Year at the 2007 IFLR Asian Awards on 1 March.
Lovells advised SoftBank throughout. Lovells was also short-listed for three other awards, including International Law Firm of the Year, M&A Team of the Year and Securitisation Team of the Year. The US$12 billion whole business securitisation of Softbank, on which Lovells also advised, was nominated as Securitisation Deal of the Year.
February 2007: Legal Business Awards 2007
Competition Team of the Year:
For the team led by Susan Bright and Simon Polito advising MasterCard UK Members Forum in the joint appeal with RBS and MasterCard International against the OFT's ruling on MasterCard's interchange arrangements.
Real Estate Team of the Year:
For the team led by Mike Gallimore, Andrew Sanders and Gill McGreevy advising Argent on the redevelopment of King's Cross Central. The regeneration scheme is one of the largest and highest profile in Europe and involved complex planning issues for the 67 acre site next to a major transport interchange containing listed buildings and conservation areas. The scheme has just received planning permission.
IFLR 1000
The 2007 IFLR 1000 legal directory has ranked Lovells among the UK market leaders for a significant number of its practice areas. For more information please
click here.
2006
Award: Transport Finance Awards 2006 Detail: Lovells' client Natixis received the Transport Finance Middle East Leasing Deal of the Year for a US$90 million optimised French tax lease on which the firm advised.
Award: Lovells receives Compliance Register Best Legal Services Award News:
We have been awarded the Best Legal Services Award for litigation, investigation and enforcement at The 2006 Compliance Register Outstanding Service to Compliance and Regulation (OStCaR) Awards held in London on 23 November.
Detail: The objective of The OStCaR Awards is to give recognition for excellence to individuals and firms in the financial services and telecoms industries. The firm, nominated alongside Clifford Chance and Herbert Smith, was voted the best for attributes such as high quality services, reasonable cost and good industry reputation by a panel of independent lawyers in the financial and telecommunications sector.
Award: Lovells IP team awarded "Best Achievement in IP Enforcement" News: We have won an award at the WORLDleaders European IP Awards 2006 which took place on 16 November.
Detail: The WORLDleaders awards, run by legal publishers Informa Law, are designed to recognise outstanding achievements by European IP practitioners. The best achievement in IP Enforcement award was received for the work we did for Anheuser-Busch Inc, concerning the BUDWEISER mark in Portugal. The team was led by Burkhart Goebel in Madrid and Dietrich Ohlgart in Hamburg.
Comment: The case concerning the Budweiser mark in Portugal is the first case for the European Court of Human Rights to rule on the protection of trademarks under the property guarantees of the European Convention of Human Rights. The judges said that this entry demonstrates creative first time use of ECC human rights for trademark protection and it demonstrates the expertise available across our offices.
Further information from Giles Daubeney.
2006 Juve Award (November)
2006 Chambers & Partners UK Legal Directory(November)
- The 2006 Chambers & Partners UK legal directory has ranked Lovells among the UK market leaders for a significant number of its practice areas. For more information please click here.
Lord Mayor of London's Dragon Awards (November)
Award: Lovells and Barclays win Community and Social Inclusion Award News (October)We have won the 2006 Community and Social Inclusion Award at the Lord Mayor of London's Dragon Awards, held on Thursday 19th October at Mansion House. The Dragon Awards recognise businesses in London which have taken an active responsibility towards their neighbouring boroughs, sharing knowledge, expertise and time through groundbreaking community projects. Detail: We made our submission for our joint project with Barclays - Bow County Court Advisory Network Scheme (BCCAN). BCCAN provides housing debt advice and representation to residents facing eviction, who come before Bow County Court. This service is the only one spread across four London boroughs covering all of the London Borough of Newham, and parts of Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest and Redbridge. Through a joint partnership with Barclays, Community Links and Lovells we have managed to secure the future of the scheme after it faced closure in 2004/5 due to lack of funding and support. The scheme provides vital help to over 1,000 people a year who face the very real prospect of losing their homes in court hearings where legal aid is not available. The service now also provides a debt advisory service on site, to help those facing eviction better manage their finances. Comment: The credit for this award goes to the forty Lovells' volunteer lawyers who attend the Court on nine afternoons a month. Between them, they have represented 452 clients with only 10 evictions. In addition, we provide a further 30 lawyers to assist with disability living allowance appeals, often for people who are also facing eviction and have been referred through the BCCAN scheme. Further information from Yasmin Waljee.
Award: New award for Lovells' Anchovy online brand protection service News (October)
Lovells' innovative use of technology has been recognised with a major professional services award for the firm's global online brand management and protection service, Anchovy. The Managing Partners' Forum (MPF) 2006 European Practice Management Award for 'Best use of Technology' is one of 14 awards honouring the contribution of different disciplines to managing a professional firm with a European presence. The award was presented at a ceremony at the Marriott Hotel, Grosvenor Square on 3 October 2006.
Detail: First introduced in 2002, MPF's awards are the only awards focusing on the full range of management disciplines in a professional services firm in Europe. The awards aim to recognise the most noteworthy contributions from best brand to best management of facilities and best marketing campaign. Anchovy is an internally grown global online brand protection service developed by the Paris IP team with our London IT developers over the last six years. It comprises domain name registration, management, recovery and protection. Part of the success of the project is demonstrated by recent work on the new .eu domain extension. Since December 2005, Anchovy and the Lovells Domain Name Practice has guided 44 clients through the complicated EC Regulations governing .eu and enabled them all to secure their intellectual property.
Comment: The judges citation reads: "Lovells' Anchovy offering outshone the competition by demonstrating a clear understanding of a highly specialised client business need to protect brands on the internet globally and showcasing the ability of the firm's lawyers, IT organisation and staff to develop and support a commercially successful online service that satisfies an important client business problem and distinguishes Lovells as an innovator able to use technology effectively to seize a real competitive advantage in the legal marketplace."
Further information on Anchovy from David Taylor and on MPF at www.mpfglobal.com.
Law Society and Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) (September)
FT Innovation rankings (June)
- Ranked 9th in table of 'Top 10 Innovations by law firms'
- 'Stand out' (top tier of three) for Public policy pro bono work ('Corporate Social Responsibility); Anchovy ('Use of Technology')
- Highly commended (second tier of three) for Mexican-Wave (Customer Relationships); Anchovy; Graduate Recruitment Website (Use of Technology)
ReActions annual survey (May)
- Ranked number 1 in Europe for Regulation, Litigation, Corporate Contracts, Policy Drafting, Insolvency and Reinsurance.
- Highly commended (top three firms) in the USA for Regulation, Corporate Contracts, Policy Drafting, Insolvency and Reinsurance.
- Commended for Litigation
The Times (April)
- The Times Graduate Recruitment Award for the best graduate recruitment website.
Managing Intellectual Property (March)
- Leading multi-jurisdictional firm in Europe
- Firm of the year - Germany
Euromoney (January)
Project Finance Deal of the Year for:
- EMEA Refinancing deal - Skynet
- EMEA Healthcare deal - Mestre
Legal Technology Awards (January)
Won:
- 'Training Initiative of the Year' for TransAct.
2005
Juve (October)
- Law Firm of the Year 2005 for M&A and EPR in Germany
The lawyer Awards 2005 (June)
- Joint third: Employment Team of the Year (Stephanie Villalba case)
Young Solicitors' Pro Bono Awards - The Law Society (June)
- Victoria Richter for Innovation (Action for Blind)
- Bow County Court Team for volunteers (Evictions)
Who's Who Legal Awards (April)
- 'Global Insurance and Reinsurance Law Firm of the Year 2005'
Naming: John Powell, Robin Spencer, Peter Taylor, John Trotter, John Young, Eric Haab, Joe McCullough, David Alberts, Gary Lee
Trade Finance Awards - Deals of the Year (March)
Duferco la Louviere (adviser to Deutsche Bank and UFJ Bank)
Pamapersada (adviser to Standard Chartered Bank)
Hong Kong Council of Social Service (January)
- 2005 Award for Caring Company received by Lovells HK
2004
Legal Week Client Survey Awards 2004 (December)
- Winner: 'Property Team of the Year'
In Brief 2004 Loties (November)
- Winner: Besy use of technology (e-discovery/ electronic disclosure)
- Winner: E-copy and Cannon merit award - Best Legal Automation Project (Mexian-Wave)
Décideurs Stratégie Finance Droit (November)
- Winner: 'Debt Capital Markets Team of Year Award'
The International Who's who of Insurance and Reinsurance Lawyers (October)
- Named number one firm in the world for reinsurance legal expertise.
Asian Legal Business (September)
- Won 'Managing Partner of the Year' (Allan Leung and Tim Hill)
- Won 'Employer of Choice'
- Plus, finalists in the categories, banking, construction, securitisation and IP.
Juve (September)
- Winner - Munich Law Firm of the Year
International Association for Continuing Legal Education's (ACLEA) (June)
- For the firm's in-house 'TransAct' training programme. 'Professional Excellence' award for 'Best Programme' is the top award in that category and is one of only 16 annual awards granted to ACLEA members representing more than 300 organisations.
Business in the Community Award for Excellence 2004 (June)
- Healthy Communities Award for Regional Programmes New Start.
Young Solicitors Group Pro Bono Awards 2004 (June)
- Shortlisted for three team awards.
The Lawyer Awards 2004 (May)
- 2nd place - Law Firm of the Year
- 2nd place - Projects/PFI Team of the Year
- 3rd place - Media IP/IT Team of the Year for our involvement in the BACSTEL-IP project
Chambers Awards 2004 (May)
- Communications/IP Law Firm of the Year
IFLR (April)
- Project Finance Team of the Year (Skynet5)
Legal Business Awards (February)
- TMT Team of the Year (for Granada/Carlton merger)
Infrastructure Journal (January)
- Deal of the Year 2003 for Skynet 5
2003
Jane's Transport Finance Awards 2003 (December)
EVCA/Real Deals European Private Equity Awards (December)
- Runner up: Law Firm of the Year
Reactions Award: Law Society of the Year (October)
- 2nd place for services to the reinsurance industry
Community Links 'Changing People's Lives Award' (October)
- For pro bono work in the east London Borough of Newham
Decideurs Juridiques Trophées du Droit (October)
- Managing Partner of the Year - Robert Follie
Juve Handbook 2003 (September)
Law Firm of the Year 2003 for:
- Private Equity & Venture Capital
- Press & Publishers (Presse & Verlage)
- Product Liability (Produkthaftung)
Legal Business 100 (September)
First place in the composite rankings
- Based on six key indicators of financial performance, Lovells is the best preforming firm of 2003
Business in the Community Awards for Excellence 2003 (July)
- Healthy Communities Award for Regional Programmes (New Start)
The Lawyer Awards 2003 (June)
- Winner: Client Care Programme of the Year (Mexican-Wave)
- 2nd place: M&A Team of the Year
- 3rd place: Pro Bono Activity of the Year
- Short listed for Law Firm of the Year
Young Solicitors Group Pro Bono Awards 2003 (June)
- Winner: Best Team (Green-Works)
International Financial Law Review Awards 2002 (April)
- Runner up: Project Finance Team of the Year
- Winner: Deal of the Year (Tube Lines)
Legal Business Awards 2003 (March)
- Honourable Mention - Compeition Team of the Year
- Honourable Mention - M&A Team of the Year
- Honourable Mention - Most Enterprising Law Firm of the Year
- Honourable Mention - Law Firm of the Year
Birmingham Post (March)
- Deal of the Year Award (Dignity Caring Funeral Services)
Asian Legal Business Awards, Singapore (March)
- Corporate Commercial Law - Andrew Ang (Lee & Lee)
- Banking Law - Paul Oldman and Andrew Ang
- Insolvency - Richard Shean
- Project Finance - James Harris
- Property - Kwan Kim Li (Lee & Lee)
- Construction - Glen Cheng (Lee & Lee)
Juve Kanzlei des Jahres (February)
- Office of the Year - Düsseldorf