Corporate & Securities Law

Orrick Fits Levi?s with Made-to-Measure Billing

By John Wallbillich

The ABA Journal reported this morning that Levi Strauss is handing all legal work worldwide (save IP) to Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe. For a flat fee. Where Orrick doesn’t have a presence, it will refer the work to other firms, which can be the hardest part of a deal like this to make work in practice.

This arrangement sounds similar to that struck by Tyco and Eversheds a few years ago for international work, which I covered here. Last week, Corporate Counsel magazine described how Tyco’s domestic US product liability work is handled by Shook, Hardy and Bacon.

This shows how a global firm really can differentiate itself with a global client. For all the talk about value pricing, it comes down to a firm taking risk and a client taking a stand.

There’s no information thusfar about how many firms Levi’s is supplanting by converging on Orrick.

(Hat tip to Ron Friedmann via Twitter).

Full post as published by The Wired GC on November 23, 2009 (boomark / email).