Dentons has posted a 6% increase in revenue to hit a record £280.5m for its business in the UK, Ireland and the Middle East (UKIME) as it becomes the latest law firm to record notable gains for the 2023/24 financial year. 

The result follows revenue growth slowing to 2% in FY23 to £265.1m amid high inflation, having jumped 14% the year before. The firm has historically opted not to disclose its overall profitability and profit per equity partner (PEP), though its revenue growth is more modest than many of its UK rivals that have published their numbers so far this reporting season, a number of which have posted double-digit increases in revenue and PEP. 

“It’s pleasing to achieve another year of record revenues,” said UKIME CEO Paul Jarvis. “We have grown revenues 22% over the past three years because of the strategic choices we have made.”

The result covers Dentons’ 14 UKIME offices across London, Milton Keynes, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dublin, Cairo, Amman, Beirut, Doha, Jeddah, Riyadh, Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Muscat. 

It represents the first full financial year of the five-year strategy Dentons launched at the end of 2022 to improve connections across its practice areas, sectors and geographies as well as exploit its global reach to increase complex cross border work and improve its approach to technology, pricing and delivery of work.  

Standout performers included the UK disputes division, which grew revenue 15%. Dentons noted the division, which includes its regulatory and investigations team, is a focus for investment, with 11 new partners recruited or promoted over the past three years in the UK and 18 across the UKIME region. 

It added the UKIME disputes division was increasingly representing clients that had traditionally worked with its corporate practice and in the past year had secured litigation places on 24 panels. 

“The strong performance of our disputes, regulatory and investigations team demonstrates how the firm as a whole is now much better hedged,” Jarvis said. “Fifteen percent revenue growth last year and 42% over three years is an outstanding result, but we measure success by how much we diversify client work across multiple areas of the business. Last year, 30 of our top 100 clients were supported by all five of our UK divisions – banking and finance, corporate, commercial, disputes and regulatory and real estate. Cross-practice collaboration is a target we set for all of our partners.”

In terms of jurisdiction, Dentons pointed to 18% revenue growth in Ireland, where it launched in 2020 and has since increased lawyer headcount to more than 35, including top-flight litigator Karyn Harty, who joined from McCann Fitzgerald in 2022 to lead its Ireland litigation practice. Corporate continued to drive growth, with the practice ranking in Mergermarket’s top 10 for M&A value and deal count in 2023.

The firm also highlighted the Middle East, where overall revenue grew 22% off the back of a string of senior hires over the past three years, including the former head of DWF’s Middle East finance and banking group, Umera Ali.

Saudi Arabia was the stand-out jurisdiction, achieving 35% revenue growth. The firm first opened in the Kingdom back in 2007 and last year became one of the first international firms to be granted a foreign law firm licence there following changes to its Code of Law Practice. 

The firm’s 50-plus strong New Law team – known as Dentons Helix – also grew revenue, by 27%, fuelled by expanding its operations through working for clients across Europe. The team offers fixed fees, standardised playbooks, matter management platforms and insight reporting; Dentons said it had also introduced AI tools to improve speed and accuracy in standard processes.

“The direction of travel is that income growth will continue to be driven by our focus on supporting clients across a broad range of business areas and geographies while setting new standards for service delivery,” Jarvis concluded.

Last week, Dentons announced that a former global vice chair of EY, Kate Barton, will take over as global CEO in November from veteran leader Elliot Portnoy.