The planned Dentons Business Services EMEA (DBSE) centre in Warsaw is a joint initiative between Dentons’ UK Middle East and Africa (UKMEA) and European arms. While Dentons has confirmed that around 50 currently UK-based roles will be affected by the move, a portion of these are reportedly fixed-term or vacant positions. According to a statement from Dentons, the firm will begin consultations with affected staff and look to begin shifting work to Warsaw over the course of 2016-2017.

Growing trend

Dentons’ announcement comes hot on the heels of a similar play from Norton Rose Fulbright which will see the firm shift 170 positions to the Philippines. The DBSE will integrate service functions including finance, business development and marketing, human resources and IT. ‘There’s a number of reasons behind this,’ commented Dentons UKMEA chief executive Jeremy Cohen to Legal Business, ‘It’s a very competitive market and we want to show our clients we can deliver cost effectively… We did an exhaustive study for many of [the] shared services and Warsaw scored very highly for value. It also has a high graduate population and we have lots of investment there,’ he added.

Further integration

Though the DBSE will be limited to back-office functions, Mr Cohen indicated that the integrated UKMEA and Europe centre may be the first of several more to come. ‘Global firm integration is critical for us,’ he commented. ‘We’re starting off in Europe and UK – we will be looking at other regions.’ 

Sources: The Lawyer; Legal Business