Law firm Shepherd and Wedderburn hails ‘solid’ growth
● Profits down amid pandemic but sales increase with work on high-profile deals
Scottish legal heavy weight Shepherd and Wedderburn has hailed“solid” growth despite a drop in profits before partner distributions in its latest financial year, which it noted was latterly affected by the coronavirus pandemic.
However, it also saw turnover increase and flagged its role in high-profile deals including advising Cairn Energy offloading assets in Senegal; Neart na Gaoithe Offshore Wind on the £2 billion financing of the offshore wind farm of the same name; and US finance giant Jpmorgan Chase on its plan to build a major technology base in Glasgow.
The Edinburgh law firm said that, in the year to 30 April, profits before partner distributions fell 1.7 per cent to £22.4 million, while turnover was up 2 per cent to £56.9m.
Its banking and finance team advised on 276 deals with a cumulative value of £64.6bn in the 12 months, a year- onyear increase of 65 per cent in the total number of deals, while its corporate finance team advised on deals with an aggregate value of more than £6bn in the year to December.
The firm highlighted the performance of its commercial disputes and regulation, real estate, pensions, employment and private client teams.
In terms of key deals, it cited its work for oil and gas explorer and producer Cairn Energy, a client of more than 30 years, in asset-disposal worth up to $400m ($303m), and Baillie Gifford on a commercial let of 280,000 square feet at the £350m Haymarket Edinburgh development.
Its work also included advising both Epic Games, developer of blockbuster video game Fortnite, on its acquisition of computer vision and facial animation technology company Cubic Motion, and the selling shareholders of Edinburgh video game data specialist DelTADNA in its sale to Us-based Unity Software.
Shepherd and Wedderburn also worked with longstanding client Indigovision – also
Edinburgh-based–on the security camera company’ s £30.4m recommended takeover by Motorola Solutions.
Furthermore, the law firm, which was founded in 1768, saw its Clean Energy Group generate record revenues, up 54 p er cent on the previous year.
Shepherd and Wedderburn managing partner Andrew Blain said: “We are pleased to report solid growth in 2019/20. Like many businesses, the last two months of the financial year were impacted by the pandemic and since then we have been operating in a very different and altogether more challenging environment.
“We will continue to look to invest in talent and technology and to take advantage of the opportunities that present themselves this year.”
The business says it is the largest Scottish-head quartered UK law firm, has offices in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, London, Dublin and Singapore. It recently said it had set up a dedicated international families group in response to a surge in demand for legal advice from overseas clients wishing to relocate to the UK.