European law firm Noerr generated more than EUR200 million in Germany in 2017 for the first time. The overall revenue of the firm also increased and reached a record level of almost EUR223 million.
This growth was in particular driven by the strategic growth areas of Corporate/M&A and Litigation.
Investments, such as the opening of an office in Hamburg, the further strengthening of the firm’s leading role in the area of digitalisation, and a successful HR policy, made a decisive contribution to this success.
The firm’s overall revenues increased by 7.5 per cent to EUR222.6m (prior year: EUR207.2m); on the German market, Noerr improved revenues by 7.1 per cent to EUR203.4 million (prior year: EUR190m). With a compound annual growth rate of 7.6 per cent, Noerr has in the last ten years clearly exceeded the development posted by Germany’s top ten law firms and almost doubled its revenues. Revenue in Central and Eastern Europe climbed to EUR19.2 million (prior year: EUR17.2 million), a strong increase of 11.5 per cent.
Once again, the strategic growth areas Corporate/M&A and Litigation in particular made a strong contribution to the firm’s success. “Another factor is the increased number of engagements for compliance advice and advising corporate bodies of DAX-30 companies, as well as in the area of digitalisation,” says co-speaker Alexander Ritvay. “This confirms our strategy of concentrating on offering premium advisory services.”
Corporate highlights in particular include cross-border large-cap transactions. Noerr for example advised the US private equity investor J.C. Flowers on its takeover of HSH Nordbank and coordinated the transaction internationally as lead counsel. Noerr also advised the Kering Group, which is listed on the French benchmark stock market index CAC 40, on the spin-off of Puma by way of a distribution in kind. Other important engagements were the assistance of Rocket Internet on its billion-euro IPO of Delivery Hero and HelloFresh with the company’s IPO in Frankfurt.
Noerr posted particularly strong growth in the area of litigation.
“We were successful in further consolidating our leading position in proceedings with UK and US elements,” says co-speaker Tobias Bürgers. “The business year was also extremely successful in the area of corporate litigation and internal investigations.” Noerr’s litigation experts in London not only successfully represented the former Olympus CEO Michael Woodford in D&O proceedings before the High Court. With Noerr’s assistance the water utility Kommunale Wasserwerke Leipzig (KWL) was also successful in asserting its claims against major banks before the Court of Appeal, which dismissed the appeal against the judgment of the High Court handed down in 2014. In Germany, Noerr advised Clemens Tönnies on the successful agreement of the restructuring of the Tönnies Group.
The practice groups Litigation and Compliance & Internal Investigations also profited from new engagements for internal investigations and providing advice to corporate bodies. In 2017, Noerr was for example actively involved in a considerable number of internal investigations for DAX companies. The expertise of Noerr’s compliance experts was also again in strong demand from the management and supervisory boards of DAX companies. The supervisory board of Deutsche Börse, for example, relied on Noerr’s advice in connection with accusations of insider trading made against its former CEO.
“This success is also thanks to a successful investment and human resources policy,” emphasises Tobias Bürgers. This includes the very successful opening of an office in Hamburg and the expansion of its office in Warsaw, which allowed Noerr to considerably strengthen its German and Polish practices. Noerr was able to welcome three lateral hires in Hamburg: Volker Land (Capital Markets), Kai-Michael Hingst (Financial Services Regulation) and Matthias Stupp (Litigation). In the meantime this office has 20 advisors and further hires are planned. Following the successful integration of a team from DJBW, Noerr has clearly increased its presence on the Polish market, in particular with respect to M&A and financing deals.
Noerr has also invested further in the future when it comes to digitalisation: “Noerr is one of the first movers in this interdisciplinary advice sector,” says Alexander Ritvay and emphasises that “in 2017 we were again engaged by leading German and foreign companies to advise on complex and strategically important digitalisation projects. We are actively shaping the digital transformation of the economy”. In order to consolidate this competitive advantage, Noerr is offering clients an even more precisely tailor-made range of advisory services with its two new practice groups Digital Business and Data Privacy.
“Finally, we were successful in attracting both talented young lawyers and experienced advisors to Noerr with credible concepts for part-time work and flexible work models,” says Tobias Bürgers. Ultimately all staff at Noerr profit from this: in the last two years the number of professionals working part-time across Noerr has increased by 5 percentage points from 11 to 16 per cent. “We don’t just offer real career opportunities on a full-time basis, as the appointment of two part-time equity partners at the beginning of this year shows,” adds Alexander Ritvay. On 1 January 2018, the firm admitted four female lawyers and one male lawyer to the partnership: Meike von Levetzow, Annette Pospich, Marlies Raschke, Bärbel Sachs and Ralph Schilha.
A campaign to promote part-time work models was particular successful in the practice group Litigation: numerous lawyers decided to join Noerr or returned to Noerr. The firm has also further developed its performance appraisal and remuneration scheme for advisors and thus increased its attractiveness for top performers. Surveys confirm this success: Noerr is ranked fifth among top employers for young lawyers in the Azur 100 ranking.
On the reporting date 31 December 2017, Noerr had 533 professionals across all offices (prior year: 486, +10 per cent) and 430 professionals in Germany (prior year: 394, +9 per cent). The firm had a total headcount on the reporting date of 1,111 employees (prior year: 1,064, +4 per cent) and 928 employees in Germany (prior year: 892, +4 per cent).
Noerr is also expecting increasing demand in strategic business areas this year and will continue to invest in these.
