I gave a talk last week at University College London. The topic was The Changing Legal Services Marketplace: A View From Across the Pond. It began with my admission of ‘acute ABS envy.’ No, ABS is not a Midlands light lager. It refers to ‘alternative business structures,’ an element of The Legal Services Act of 2007 (LSA). LSA—and ABS–is the UK’s re-regulation of its legal industry intended to spur innovation and competition to better serve the public. ABS–among other things– removes long-standing regulations preventing non-lawyers from ownership, profit sharing, and other managerial functions in law firms. Those restrictions made sense when legal delivery was solely about selling legal expertise. But they are now impediments to structural changes necessary to jump start new models at a time when legal delivery involves legal, IT, and process expertise.

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