Firms Closer to Setting Up in India and Leading Lawyer Blasts Hourly Rate

Two issues close to my heart received prominent press coverage over the last week.

The UK Law Society Gazette ran a piece discussing the Indian government's recently taken legislative step towards opening up the country’s legal market to foreign firms. I blogged about this back in October (click here), and now the Indian parliament has finally passed a bill allowing the formation of limited liability partnerships.

Originally introduced in January 2006, the bill itself will not liberalise the legal services market. However, assuming the necessary secondary regulations are passed, it will enable Indian law firms to form LLPs with no limit on partner numbers and allow foreign firms to form their own India LLPs. To read the full Gazette article click here.

Although many have been predicting the demise of the hourly rate for years, it was still refreshing to read Evan R. Chesler, the Presiding partner at Cravath, advocating the proposterous contradictions of this antiquated method of client billing. Click here for the Forbes piece in question. I wrote the first draft of my article, Time to Stop Time Recording three years ago now, and I do believe that even though the legal profession is notoriously slow in embracing innovation, that the times, they are, at least beginning to change.