The Lawyer: Poland - Warsaw packed

An influx of global firms and a rush of indie spin-offs has created an overcrowded legal market in Poland – and fees are suffering.

A logjam of associates frustrated by a lack of partnership prospects at global and leading local law firms in Warsaw has created a rash of spin-off boutiques – and triggered a nose-dive in client fees.

“Poland is the only significant legal market in Europe where rates over the past 20 years have gone down not up,” is the blunt assessment of one experienced local partner.

There have been plenty of cheerleaders for the Polish economy over the best part of the last generation. The country has famously experienced unbroken GDP growth during the past 20 years, not even slipping during the ‘Great Recession’.

Global and local legal professions have thrived in Poland since the country’s economy liberalised with the disbanding of the Warsaw Pact in 1991. But have the good times for lawyers faltered if not exactly come skidding to a halt?

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Source: The Lawyer, 16 March 2015