Global law firm CMS has secured a deal to add India’s seventh-largest law firm, Induslaw, to its network.
The news comes just a few weeks after the Bar Council of India amended its rules to allow foreign law firms and lawyers to practise in the country for the first time, promising to bring an end to decades of isolation in India’s legal market.
CMS hailed the development as a “significant step” in its Asia expansion strategy.
India is projected to become the world’s third-largest economy by 2027, with CMS saying the arrangement with Induslaw will enable it to provide complex cross-border legal services.
Induslaw has 400 lawyers across India’s commercial hubs, including Bengaluru, Delhi, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Chennai. The firm advises many of India’s leading companies, including more than half of the unicorns established in the last decade.
Under the arrangement, Induslaw lawyers will support multinational CMS clients looking to enter and operate in the Indian market, while the more than 6,800 CMS lawyers across its network of 45 countries will support clients wanting to expand internationally from India.
Duncan Weston, executive partner at CMS, said: “With India’s economy being increasingly integrated into the global economic system, the need for legal advisers capable of bridging local and international jurisdictions has never been more critical. With Induslaw now a CMS member firm, we can offer clients a coordinated, full-service legal platform in India, one of the fastest-growing and most strategically important markets in the world.”
In a joint statement, Induslaw’s founding partners Avimukt Dar, Gaurav Dani, Kartik Ganapathy and Suneeth Katarki added: “Joining CMS not only aligns with our strategic goals but enhances the value that we offer to our clients as well as our fee earners. This reflects our shared vision to offer effective and world-class legal solutions with global perspectives.”
In line with the CMS model, Induslaw will remain an independent law firm under the CMS brand. The firm expects the onboarding of Induslaw to be complete by the end of 2025.
Dentons established a similar structure in 2023 when it combined with Link Legal, becoming the first international firm to formally partner with an Indian firm under local ownership and management. The Indian firm operates as Dentons Link Legal.
The CMS deal comes hard on the heels of the Bar Council of India’s announcement on 14 May that it has amended its rules to allow foreign lawyers and firms to practise in India – albeit with significant conditions – on a reciprocal basis.
The amendments enable foreign legal professionals to advise on non-litigious matters involving foreign or international law and participate in international arbitration proceedings conducted in India.
However, questions remain over precisely how the rules will work in practice.
CMS’s agreement to tie up with Induslaw comes three months after its Hong Kong arm merged with its local alliance firm Lau Horton & Wise to create CMS Hong Kong, adding capabilities in banking and finance, corporate/M&A, dispute resolution and international arbitration.
In November 2023, top 10 Swedish firm Wistrand joined the network.
Email your news and story ideas to: [email protected]
