I’m currently an associate in our finance division, specifically in the restructuring and insolvency group. I studied Jurisprudence at Queen's College, Oxford and graduated in 2006.
Why choose Herbert Smith?
Naturally, Herbert Smith has a reputation for legal excellence and understanding, in a huge degree of detail, the law and the particular practical ramifications of that, and I’d probably stress that the key importance there is it’s the practical application of it. Yes you need to know the law, but it’s more important you can understand the implications of that and its effect on your client and how best to advise them in light of that.
A big advantage of the firm is its mix of difference practice areas. It’s got a large corporate and litigation practice for which it’s very well known, but it’s also got a number of other large self standing departments.
The culture
The working life culture at Herbert Smith, is as you would expect being an international top tier law firm dealing with the very biggest work, it’s an intellectually rigorous environment. Now, that means that you drill down into the areas of law and particularly the deals you’re going on, you get a huge amount of understanding very swiftly and you’re working with people who are experts in their field. But then, in equal part, there’s the fact that I’ve found the firm extremely collegiate in as much as, you do have individuals working to meet deadlines, but it’s done so in a supportive manner, and the mix of those two I find helps your own personal development and helps moves you along at a swift pace.
The Nortel deal
Herbert Smith acts for the joint administrators for the European arm of the Nortel Group. The Nortel Group was previously a telecommunications giant. However at the start of 2009 a decision was taken that it could no longer continue to trade, and the Canadian, the US and the European arms of the business entered insolvency protection as part of a coordinated filing.
The way this was done was utilizing a novel procedure under the EC regulation on insolvency proceedings. We advised the joint administrators in their capacity of administrators of nineteen different European companies, all of which are in an English administration.