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Slater and Gordon Agree to £33MM Committed Facility with Harbour

By John Freund |

Leading UK consumer law firm Slater and Gordon has agreed a £33 million committed facility with litigation funder and lender to law firms, Harbour, in what is believed to be one of the largest lending deals in the sector this year.

Slater and Gordon firm will use Harbour’s capital to invest in developing its consumer legal services teams, and to fund a substantial book of clinical negligence and other personal injury claims, consistent with its strategy to be one of the UK’s leading provider of personal injury and related services.

Harbour is the world’s largest privately owned litigation funder. Through its increasingly close strategic relationships with law firms, Harbour has broadened its investment appetite over the last 18 months to include the provision of lending and credit facilities to law firms, supporting them in the execution of their growth plans.  Unlike some traditional lenders, funds can be used for multiple purposes, which gives the leaders of multi-strategy law firms flexibility in executing projects involving multiple workstreams or multiple practice areas.

Nils Stoesser, Chief Executive Officer of Slater and Gordon, said: “The ethos of the entire Slater and Gordon team is to support our clients by delivering an exceptional service across a whole range of consumer law issues.  We have been looking for a financial partner to help us capitalise on the next stages of the firm’s growth, and we are we are delighted to have Harbour’s support and confidence in our future.”

Elizabeth Comley, Chief Operating Officer of Slater and Gordon, said: “The facility we have agreed with Harbour gives us access to stable capital over several years which we can use to make substantial investment in our core consumer legal services businesses.  We have big growth ambitions for our personal injury, clinical negligence, and other practice areas, where we know we have a competitive advantage. This new facility allows us to realise those ambitions, and in Harbour we’ve found a natural partner who really understand the needs and business of law firms.”

Ellora MacPherson, Managing Director and Chief Investment Officer at Harbour, added: “Harbour is pleased to be supporting Slater and Gordon with this new credit facility. We are excited about their future growth plans as reflected by this significant investment.  We look forward to our partnership together.”

Harbour has recently provided credit facilities to Bamboo Group and to Rothley Law.  A team from FRP Advisory led by Andrew Dimmock were instructed by Slater and Gordon to assist with sourcing a debt facility.

Slater and Gordon’s previous working capital facility from VFS Legal is now replaced by this facility from Harbour.

About Slater and Gordon

Slater and Gordon is one of the UK’s largest law firms. With a team of highly skilled and experienced lawyers, paralegals, medical experts, rehabilitation co-ordinators and support staff, Slater and Gordon provide comprehensive legal services across a number of specialties.

Headquartered in Manchester with 11 offices across the UK, Slater and Gordon specialises in consumer legal services, including serious injury, clinical negligence, abuse law, court of protection, employment and family law matters.

Slater and Gordon has been recognised by multiple independent legal guides such as Chambers and Legal 500 and is highly specialised in representing individuals who’ve been affected by life-changing and serious injuries.

About Harbour

Harbour is the world’s largest privately owned litigation funder, which now also lends and provides credit facilities to law firms. Since launching in 2007, the business has been at the forefront of the growth and development of the global funding market. In the summer of 2023 it also announced facilities for Rothley Law and Bamboo Legal Services.

Headquartered in London, the business funds cases across the globe ranging from one-off disputes valued from circa. £1m to portfolios of multi-million-pound cases, as well as loans and credit facilities for law firms with no upper limit.

Harbour is a founder member of the Association of Litigation Funders (ALF), a member of the International Legal Finance Association (ILFA).

Ellora MacPherson is Managing Director and Chief Investment officer.

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Announcements Commercial People Moves

Darrow Names Mathew Keshav Lewis As Chief Revenue Officer & US General Manager

By John Freund |

Darrow, the leading AI-powered justice intelligence platform, today announced the appointment of Mathew Keshav Lewis as its first Chief Revenue Officer and US General Manager. Lewis brings over 20 years of experience driving revenue and growth for high-profile legal and technology companies – including SaaS platform Dealpath, alternative investment platform Yieldstreet, and legal services pioneer Axiom Law – and will be responsible for helping Darrow scale as it continues an accelerated growth trajectory. 

"Mathew's arrival at Darrow opens enterprise-level deals to all plaintiff law firms, previously accessible only to a select few,” said Evyatar Ben Artzi, CEO and Co-Founder of Darrow. “His expertise from YieldStreet and Axiom empowers our partners to leverage AI, driving unprecedented growth and innovation.” 

Lewis, who will be based in Darrow’s New York headquarters, joins Darrow after serving as the first Chief Revenue Officer of Dealpath, a real estate deal management platform. He also previously held the role of Chief Revenue Officer and GM, Investments at Yieldstreet, where he drove record revenue and growth for the investment platform. 

“I’m delighted to join a team of tremendously talented individuals at Darrow, who have already disrupted the legal technology space and forged the path ahead,” said Mathew Keshav Lewis, Chief Revenue Officer & US General Manager of Darrow. “I am inspired by Darrow’s progress to date, and I look forward to working alongside Darrow’s growing team to expand the company’s footprint.”

This announcement comes at a period of rapid growth for the company, which completed its $35 million Series B funding round last year. Darrow currently works on active litigation valued over $10 billion across legal domains such as privacy, consumer protection, and antitrust. 

About Darrow: Founded in 2020, Darrow is a LegalTech company on a mission to fuel law firm growth and deliver justice for victims of class and mass action lawsuits. Darrow's AI-powered justice intelligence platform leverages generative AI and world-class legal experts and technologists to uncover egregious violations across legal domains spanning privacy and data breach, consumer protection, securities and financial fraud, environment, and employment. Darrow is based out of New York City and Tel Aviv. For more information, visit: darrow.ai. 

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Announcements Commercial

Omni Bridgeway Releases Investment Portfolio Report for 3Q24

By John Freund |

Omni Bridgeway Limited (ASX: OBL) (Omni Bridgeway, OBL, Group) announces the key investment performance metrics for the three months ended 31 March 2024 (3Q24, Quarter) and for the financial year to date (FYTD).

Summary

  • Investment income of A$296 million FYTD; A$56 million provisionally attributable to OBL.
  • 23 full completions, 17 partial completions FYTD, with an overall multiple on invested capital (MOIC) of2.0x.
  • A$333 million of new commitments FYTD with a corresponding A$447 million in new fair value, on track to achieve our A$625 million target.
  • Pricing remains at improved levels, up 32% for the FYTD compared to FY23.
  • Strong pipeline, with agreed term sheets outstanding for an estimated A$212 million in new commitments.
  • OBL cash and receivables of A$101 million plus A$60 million in undrawn debt at 31 March 2024.
  • A$4.4 billion of possible estimated portfolio value (EPV) in completions over the next 12 months. 
  • Further simplification and enhancement of our disclosures as announced at the Annual General Meeting, comprising non-IFRS OBL-only financials and non-IFRS fair value on a portfolio basis and OBL-only basis.
  • These new disclosures and metrics, as well as a valuation framework for our existing book and platform, were presented at our investor day on 27 March 2024.

Refer to https://omnibridgeway.com/investors/investor-day.

Key metrics and developments for the Quarter

Income and completions

  • Investment income of A$296 million generated from A$193 million income recognised and A$103 million income yet to be recognised (IYTBR), with A$56 million provisionally attributable to OBL FYTD (excluding management and performance fees). 
  • During the Quarter, 11 full completions and 11 partial completions (excluding IYTBR), resulting in 23 full completions and 17 partial completions (excluding IYTBR) FYTD, and one secondary market transaction, with a FYTD overall MOIC of 2.0x.

New commitments

  • Our stated targets for FY24 include A$625 million in new commitments or equivalent value, prioritising value over volume to reflect potential for improved pricing of new commitments.
  • FYTD new commitments of A$333 million at 31 March 2024 (from matters that were newly funded, conditionally approved or had increased investment opportunities). 
  • The fair value associated with these commitments is $447million, 72% of the full year value generation target.
  • Pipeline of 37 agreed exclusive term sheets, representing approximately A$212 million in investment opportunities, which if converted into funded investments is a further 34% of our FY24 commitments target.  
  • In addition to the regular new commitments to investments in the existing funds FYTD, an additional A$11.5 million of external co-fundings were secured for these investments to manage fund concentration limits. OBL will be entitled to management fees as well as performance fees on such external co-funding.

Portfolio review

  • A$4.4 billion of EPV is assessed to possibly complete in the 12 months following the end of the quarter. This 12 month rolling EPV is based on investments which are subject to various stages of (anticipated) settlement discussions or for which an award or a judgment is expected. All or only part of these may actually complete during the 12 month period.
  • We anticipate replacing these final EPV metrics with fair value metrics by the end of this financial year.

Cash reporting and financial position

  • At 31 March 2024, the Group held A$100.7 million in cash and receivables (A$62.8 million in OBL balance sheet cash, A$2.0 million in OBL balance sheet receivables and A$35.9 million of OBL share of cash and receivables within Funds) plus access to a further A$60 million in debt.
  • In aggregate, we have approximately A$161 million to meet operational needs, interest payments, and fund investments before recognising any investment completions, secondary market sales, management and transaction fees, and associated fund performance fees.
  • Post Quarter-end and as per the date of this report, in anticipation of the expiry of the availability period of the debt facility, OBL has drawn down the A$60 million in undrawn debt and received the funds.

Investor day

The investor day presentation and Q&A which took place on 27 March 2024 can be viewed at https://omnibridgeway.com/investors/investor-day.

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Carpentum Capital Launches Aurigon Litigation Risk Consulting (LRC)

By John Freund |

The team around former Carpentum Capital has launched AURIGON LITIGATION RISK CONSULTING (LRC), a litigation funding intermediary based in Switzerland with a special focus on Latin America. 

Founder and Managing Director Dr. Detlef A. Huber comments: ”AURIGON LRC is combining two worlds, litigation finance and insurance. Both areas are increasingly overlapping. Insurers offer ever more litigation risk transfer products and funders recur to insurance to hedge their risks. Hence complexity and advisory requirements are increasing, especially in still developing markets like Latin America. With our team of lawyers and former re/insurance executives trained in Latin America, the US, UK and Europe we are perfectly suited to advice our clients in any stage of the funding process or in related insurance matters. Our goal is to become the preferred partner for litigation and arbitration funding projects out of Latin American jurisdictions and I am looking forward to this new adventure.”

ABOUT AURIGON

AURIGON Advisors Ltd. is operating as re/insurance consultancy since 2011 with a special focus on dispute resolution and auditing. With AURIGON LRC an intermediary for litigation funding has been launched servicing our clients out of Argentina, Chile, Brazil and Switzerland in Spanish, English, Portuguese and German. With our experience setting up the first Swiss litigation fund dedicated to Latin America (founded 2018), and in the insurance advisory area (since 2011), we are bringing together knowledge of processes and mindsets of the funding and the insurance world. 

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