Osborne Clarke is an international

legal practice Legal practice is sometimes used to distinguish the body of judicial or administrative precedents, rules, policies, customs, and doctrines from legislative enactments such as statutes and constitutions which might be called "laws" in the strict ...

headquartered in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, England with offices in the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Belgium, Spain, Sweden, France, the Netherlands, China, India via BTG Legal, Singapore, the United States and Poland. The firm has over 320 partners and more than 2,440 employees spread across its 25 offices around the world. The firm's headquarters are located in

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

. The firm played a significant role in the development of the railways in Southern England through its historic relationship with

Isambard Kingdom Brunel Isambard Kingdom Brunel (; 9 April 1806 – 15 September 1859) was a British civil engineer who is considered "one of the most ingenious and prolific figures in engineering history," "one of the 19th-century engineering giants," and "on ...

and the Great Western Railway.

History

Osborne Clarke was founded in

Bristol Bristol () is a city, ceremonial county and unitary authority in England. Situated on the River Avon, it is bordered by the ceremonial counties of Gloucestershire to the north and Somerset to the south. Bristol is the most populous city in ...

, England, in 1748 by Jeremiah Osborne. In 1987 Osborne Clarke opened its first

office. Over the next decade the firm opened offices in

Reading Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of letters, symbols, etc., especially by sight or touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifaceted process involving such areas as word recognition, orthography (spelling ...

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.6 millio ...

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

and

Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo Coun ...

. The law firm played a significant part in the development of the railways in the UK when it was appointed to represent the Great Western Railway Company, working closely with

on the establishment of the Great Western Main Line route from

London Paddington Paddington, also known as London Paddington, is a Central London railway terminus and London Underground station complex, located on Praed Street in the Paddington area. The site has been the London terminus of services provided by the Great ...

and the West Country. The nature of the relationship between Osborne Clarke and Brunel is best highlighted by one notable occasion when Jeremiah Osborne the Third (grandson to the founder) is said to have personally rowed Brunel down the River Avon to survey the bank for the route of the Great Western Railway. The partnership's recent history has been characterised by two strands of development. Firstly, they have undertaken significant international expansion, particularly into the United States and Germany where they are now the 41st largest law firm. On 9 July 2012 the firm announced that two European firms, SLA Studio Legale Associato in Italy and Spanish firm Osborne Clarke Spain, had become part of Osborne Clarke. Secondly the firm has seen considerable expansion in the media and technology sectors, in which they are considered a tier 1 firm. Notable clients in this sector include

Yahoo! Yahoo! (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web services provider. It is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California and operated by the namesake company Yahoo Inc., which is 90% owned by investment funds managed by Apollo Global Manage ...

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Mosk ...

, Dell, PwC,

Google Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...

, Pokémon Company and Tripadvisor. The firm is constantly ranked high in various legal directories and rankings. In 2015 Osborne Clarke was named '' The Lawyer's'' firm of the year. The firm is also known for its strong corporate culture. In 2019 the firm was awarded the ''Best Corporate Culture Award'' at the Managing Partners Forum (MAP) Awards.

Key dates

* 1748 – Jeremiah Osborne starts practising law in Bristol. * 1833 – Firm works closely with

on the building of the Great Western Railway. The firm remains the company’s solicitor for many years. * 1969 – The modern firm is created by the merger of the Osborne and Clarke law firms. * 1987 – Firm opens its

office – the first regional law firm to do so. * 1998 – Opens

Thames Valley The Thames Valley is an informally-defined sub-region of South East England, centred on the River Thames west of London, with Oxford as a major centre. Its boundaries vary with context. The area is a major tourist destination and economic hub, ...

office in

. * 2000 – Opens

office in

Palo Alto Palo Alto (; Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. The city was es ...

, California. * 2001 – Opens office in

, Germany. * 2012 – Merges with Italian and Spanish firms, gaining offices in

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

Padova Padua ( ; it, Padova ; vec, Pàdova) is a city and ''comune'' in Veneto, northern Italy. Padua is on the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice. It is the capital of the province of Padua. It is also the economic and communications hub of the ...

Brescia Brescia (, locally ; lmo, link=no, label= Lombard, Brèsa ; lat, Brixia; vec, Bressa) is a city and ''comune'' in the region of Lombardy, Northern Italy. It is situated at the foot of the Alps, a few kilometers from the lakes Garda and Iseo ...

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the Largest cities of the Europ ...

and

Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...

. * 2013 – Opens in

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

and New York. * 2014 – Opens in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population of 907,976 within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban ar ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

. and

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' fin ...

. * 2016 – Opens in

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...

. * 2017 – Opens in

Mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...

, Sweden and

Bangalore Bangalore (), List of renamed places in India, officially Bengaluru (), is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the Indian state of Karnataka. It has a population of more than and a metropolitan area, metropolitan population of a ...

. *2019 – Relationship firm BTG Legal opens office in

Delhi Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders ...

Structure

After expanding significantly through the

dot-com bubble The dot-com bubble (dot-com boom, tech bubble, or the Internet bubble) was a stock market bubble in the late 1990s, a period of massive growth in the use and adoption of the Internet. Between 1995 and its peak in March 2000, the Nasdaq Compo ...

of the late nineties and early 2000s, the firm has undergone a comprehensive restructure. The firm retains a comprehensive range of departments, however Osborne Clarke is considered a first tier firm in both the Media and Entertainment and Brand Management sectors.

Management

International Council chairman Stefan Rizor has been re-elected for a second term. Omar Al-Nuaimi is the International CEO.

Key industry sectors

The firm has established a reputation for working in a number of sectors, but references the following list on their corporate website: *

Energy In physics, energy (from Ancient Greek: ἐνέργεια, ''enérgeia'', “activity”) is the quantitative property that is transferred to a body or to a physical system, recognizable in the performance of work and in the form of hea ...

and

Utilities A public utility company (usually just utility) is an organization that maintains the infrastructure for a public service (often also providing a service using that infrastructure). Public utilities are subject to forms of public control and ...

* Financial Services * Life Sciences and Healthcare *

Real Estate Real estate is property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this (also) an item of real property, (more general ...

and Infrastructure * Workforce Solutions *

Retail Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholesaler, and ...

and Consumer *

Tech Tech or The Tech may refer to: * An abbreviation of technology or technician * Tech Dinghy, an American sailing dinghy developed at MIT * Tech (mascot), the mascot of Louisiana Tech University, U.S. * Tech (river), in southern France * "Tech" ...

, Media and Comms *

Transport Transport (in British English), or transportation (in American English), is the intentional movement of humans, animals, and goods from one location to another. Modes of transport include air, land ( rail and road), water, cable, pipelin ...

and Automotive

Notable cases

* Osborne Clarke acted on behalf of

Carphone Warehouse The Carphone Warehouse Limited was a mobile phone retailer based in London, United Kingdom. In August 2014 the company became a subsidiary of Currys plc (previously named "Dixons Carphone"), which was formed by the merger of its former parent Ca ...

on the £2 billion demerger of its fixed line business TalkTalk. * Osborne Clarke advised

London & Continental Railways London and Continental Railways (LCR) is a property development company owned by the Government of the United Kingdom for developing former railway land. The company was originally established in 1994 as a private consortium to own European Pa ...

and

Eurostar International Limited Eurostar International LimitedCompanies House extract company no 2 ...

on the development of

St Pancras station St Pancras railway station (), also known as London St Pancras or St Pancras International and officially since 2007 as London St Pancras International, is a central London railway terminus on Euston Road in the London Borough of Camden. It ...

, London as an international rail terminal. * Osborne Clarke advised Babcock Marine on £1 billion defence contracts, including the £560 million extension of the Warship Support Modernisation Initiative. * Osborne Clarke advised Grand Central on its sale to

Arriva Arriva plc is a British multinational public transport company headquartered in Sunderland, England. * Osborne Clarke advised CBRE Global Investors on the £161.5m sale and leaseback of Park Plaza London Waterloo * Osborne Clarke acted for the management team of Odeon &

UCI Cinema UCI Cinemas (''United Cinemas International'') is a brand of cinema, currently operating in Germany, Italy, Portugal, and Brazil, which has been owned since 2004 by Odeon Cinemas Group, whose owner is now AMC Theatres, except for the UCI Cinemas ...

Group in December 2016 on the £921m sale of Odeon & UCI by private equity firm Terra Firma. * Osborne Clarke advised

Grifols Grifols, S.A. () is a Spanish multinational pharmaceutical and chemical manufacturer. Principally a producer of blood plasma-based products, a field in which it is the European leader and largest worldwide, the company also supplies devices, ins ...

on a $6.3bn refinancing; the second largest refinancing of a Spanish company in history.

References

{{Legal services in the United Kingdom Law firms of the United Kingdom Law firms established in 1748 1748 establishments in England British companies established in 1748 Foreign law firms with offices in the Netherlands