Managing partners of some of Ireland’s top firms tell Ben Haugh about the biggest legal challenges that businesses should be aware of this year

ACTIVITY

Despite a subdued start to the year on the deal front, 2024 was another year of strong growth.

There is some geopolitical unpredictability currently, but we also expect steady growth this year.

Clients are more discerning than ever and there is a lot of competition in the market as newer entrants begin to scale.

Clients tell us they expect real sector and industry insight, so we have invested more heavily in areas where we are particularly strong, such as housing, CRE, energy, planning and environment, infrastructure, project finance and government.

In these areas, we believe that we add value to business strategy and risk management/mitigation and help clients deliver on ambitious deals and projects.

INNOVATION

The opportunities associated with AI are incredible.

Eventually, legal research, contract review and certain elements of due diligence will be AI-driven.

However, having trialled Harvey and some other AI tools, we are taking a cautious approach.

We are making improvements to document automation and client interactivity through our secure client hub and we use AI-powered litigation tools for eDiscovery, document review and investigations.

We expect reliable legal research and due diligence tools to be available in the next three years and this is under constant review by our head of innovation.

However, law firms very much remain people businesses — that’s evidenced by the growth in solicitor numbers in all of the larger Irish firms last year.

OUTLOOK

We have a new government with a strong mandate to run for five years, so clarity of vision and purpose is required.

There are some fundamental societal requirements: more housing and accommodation, better infrastructure of all kinds, and energy transition, which will drive legal activity.

In terms of major projects, Ireland needs to return to being an attractive destination for international capital, as the scale of development and investment required cannot be met by the state and lending from pillar banks alone.

The prominent presence of ISIF at MIPIM recently was a welcome initiative to show that Ireland is a destination for secure, longterm investment.

We also need to constantly nurture and improve the ecosystem for setting up and scaling domestic business — this needs to be ramped up significantly in light of re-shoring efforts by the new US government.

Specifically in the legal market, we seem to have entered the long-predicted phase of consolidation in the mid-tier of Irish law firms and we believe this creates an opportunity for us to attract high-calibre lawyers during a phase of disruption.