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

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).