Just as we were publishing a story profiling the laughable comments from AAR Chief Executive Partner Michael Rose that he doesn’t think about money “too much”, a big legal news was unfolding in Australia on Friday, coincidentally involving AAR. That story was the apparent revelation that Allens Arthur Robinson had formalised an alliance with a Japanese firm.
It was reported on by the AFR, Lawyers Weekly, ALB, AM Law and The Australian that AAR has set up an international alliance with Japanese firm Nagashima Ohno & Tsunematsu. According to the AAR media release:
Allens Arthur Robinson (Allens) and Nagashima Ohno & Tsunematsu (NO&T) will launch a cooperative framework to service clients operating in the region… Allens will second lawyers to NO&T’s Tokyo office and NO&T to Allens offices with both firms working together on marketing and training projects in the region. Both firms will retain their structural and financial independence
In explicating the motives underlying the alliance, the AAR partner heading up the initiative, Tim Lester, told Lawyers Weekly on Friday that:
“You need to be credible in each market in which you operate and to be credible, you need to have appropriate size and you need a credible mass.”
What the team here at Firm Spy found decidedly incredible is the fact that this alliance has apparently been in existence for several years and that this is total non-story. Or worse; a ruse to deflect attention away from the rumoured imminent closure of the firm’s Bangkok and Phnom Penh offices.
We received the following excellent tip-offs on the weekend from anonymous AAR spies:
First this:
What a load of sh*t about this ‘new’ Japanese alliance. Allens has had at least one lawyer seconded to NO&T at all times since at least 2005. Is this ‘news’ just to distract us from the closure of some of its Asian offices??
Then this:
Not sure what the fuss is about regarding Allens and Nagashima Ohno & Tsunematsu – we’ve been sending lawyers there for the entire time I have been with the firm.
In fact, Mr Lester alluded to the existence of some sort of pre-existing relationship with NO&T in his comments to ALB. He said:
“We already have a lawyer in NO&T offices in Japan.”
Given that both firms will retain their financial and structural independence and that the scope of the alliance doesn’t appear to extend much further than secondments, is it possible that this is just a regurgitation of some very old news? That is, old news regurgitated at an opportune moment, given that anticpated closure of some of the firm’s other Asian offices?
Do you think Allens is “credible in the market”?
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The Brisbane office – then Feez Ruthning – was sending secondees to N&O back in the early 90s …