Steady progress at Pinsent Masons

International law firm Pinsent Masons, which employs 550 people in Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen, has today announced details of its unaudited financial results for 2015-16.

The firm achieved global turnover of £382.3 million. This represents 5.5 per cent revenue growth on the previous year’s £362m and cumulative revenue growth of almost 20% over the past three years. The firm’s profit per partner increased by 2.3 per cent on the previous year to £550k.

Top performing sectors included advance manufacturing and technology, financial services and infrastructure which accounted for around 20 per cent of global turnover, while energy and real estate contributed about 12 per cent each.

In Scotland the firm was involved in some of the largest corporate deals completed in the last year, including the largest transactions in the oil and gas and food and drinks industries.

The firm acted on Total’s £585m disposal of the St Fergus gas terminal and North Sea infrastructure and the £98.4m acquisition of Macduff Shellfish by Canadian group Clearwater Seafoods. It was also appointed to advise on the £410m Aberdeen Harbour extension and the Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route project, and is acting for five local authorities engaged in Scotland’s largest joint waste treatment and disposal project.

Pinsent Masons managing partner, John Cleland, said: “We have a good deal of momentum in the business and our focus now is on supporting clients based in the UK and elsewhere through what is likely to be a volatile and unpredictable trading period. Some time ago we assembled a multi-disciplinary Brexit Advisory Team which is already engaged with clients globally to address the challenges and opportunities linked to Brexit.”

Scotland and Northern Ireland chairman, Kirk Murdoch (pictured), added: “We have had a very positive year as a result of three things: a genuine commitment to sector specialism to complement our legal expertise, internationalisation of our business to support our clients in growth markets, and innovation. The latter is particularly important in Aberdeen in the current climate where businesses want efficiency as well as excellence from their advisers.”

“We are giving our clients in Scotland what they ask for, and they are responding to that. The start of 2016 has been very positive, with our corporate team having acted on deals worth in excess of £1.5bn, while our projects team recently reached financial close for SSE on its £2.6bn financing of the Beatrice offshore wind farm in the Moray Firth.”

Mr. Murdoch, who leads a team more than 70 Partners, said a combination of strong financial growth, continued international expansion and a sustained approach to delivering innovative services to clients, had led to Pinsent Masons being named Law Firm of the Year in April at the Legal Business Awards

Part of that innovative approach saw Pinsent Masons acquire a majority stake in the cloud-based compliance service Cerico, with Glasgow-based corporate partner Richard Masters taking on the role of executive chairman.

Recently the firm made 18 partner promotions, (three in Scotland) and appointed its first external Board member, Pauline Egan, and first chief operating officer, Alastair Mitchell, while former Secretary of State Douglas Alexander joined as a strategic adviser to support the firm’s responsible business agenda.