28 IT systems – and fail to spend enough time in advance on “client strategy (eg, account management, conflicts management, practice development and industry focus) and a firm’s culture and people (eg, agreeing common working practices, keeping and developing its joint talent)”. When looking forward a senior partner from one of the leading firms adds: “I think more mergers will follow with a handful of firms eventually emerging which will be much larger than others. I think clients will be seeking to use the mega firms for transactional work and regulatory work. Smaller firms will continue to thrive in niche areas such as tax, litigation, family law and more. I also thinkmega firmswill seek newgrowth engines including advisory services on non-legal matters leveraging their brand, resources and connection with key clients.” “The Israeli legal market is changing rapidly,” adds Idan Nishlis, CEO of Nishlis Legal Marketing: ”I can imagine scenarios that have never been relevant till now, such as: an international law firm merging with an Israeli firm (such as Kennedys and Zelichov last year) and a triple merger.” Nishlis adds: “Mergers among law firms is obviously not a new trend, but it did pick up in 2022, in the wake of the global challenges and current legal trends. Between 2019-2021, there are approximately 40 mergers (including departments leaving a firm to join another), in Israel. In 2022 we might have seen fewer mergers, but nonetheless, much bigger ones – including law two top-30 law firms that dissolved. It is interesting to see that in 2019 and 2020 there were 180 law firm mergers in the US (see graph below) and 250 law firm mergers in the UK (see graph below). With the US and UK legal markets much bigger than the Israeli market, we can see how dynamic the Israel legal market is, and at the same time attune with global legal market trends.” These are interesting times.
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