Minter Ellison

Introduction

Minter Ellison has a long history, with its roots dating back to Sydney in 1827. The firm’s very first international office opened in London in 1974 and since then Minters has been increasing its global reach.
The firm launched a Beijing office in August 2010. And in February 2012, Minters became the second Aussie firm to seek to take advantage of the rich pickings available in Mongolia, with a new Ulaanbaatar office. The Minter Ellison Legal Group now has 16 offices spread across five countries – including New Zealand and China.

Performance

The 2010/11 financial year was been a pretty good one for Minters. It placed top for revenue for the second year in a row, posting figures of $523.4 million, equating to a 4.1% increase on the previous years’ efforts.

Minters has been involved in some pretty impressive deals including a series of transactions with the Mirvac, estimated to be worth $2.1 billion, undertaken by the firm’s equity capital markets team. Restructuring and insolvency is one of the firm’s major strengths and it acts for a clutch of big banks including ANZ, CBA and BankWest.  Minters’ competition team has been busy billing too, notably Hertz on the Aussie aspects of its $1.3 billion acquisition of Dollar Thrifty Automobile Group. All in, some pretty big ticket work.

But it’s not all beer and skittles. In August, the firm suffered an embarrassing blow when it discovered that its former CFO had disappeared $2.7m from the partnership accounts. Then the firm managed to lose its entire WA practice, Minter Ellison Perth (MEP), to Squire Sanders which snapped up the 18-partner team. MEP wasn’t a fully integrated part of the Minters’ empire, but discussions to make the union more formal had been going on for about a year making MEP’s decision to defect slightly humiliating for the firm.

Not one to dwell, Minters announced that it would have its very own, fully integrated firm in operation before Squire Sanders new offering was even up and running. And it’s bolstering up overseas, too. The firm’s Hong Kong headcount has been increased by the arrival of three partners from Jones Day, as well lateral hires from Hogan Lovells and Linklaters.

Pay and Conditions

Minters fared very poorly in this year’s Firm of the Year survey; the worst performing of the Big Six firms, it came bottom to last overall. One of the most frequent criticisms was the average pay. Respondents claimed salaries were “at the lower end of the top tier range” and there were multiple moans about a “farcical” bonus system with payments often delayed for months. The general consensus is that lawyers don’t feel adequately rewarded for the long hours they put in.

Conclusion
If it’s good quality work and clever colleagues you’re after, Minters is a decent bet. But expect long hours and don’t pin your hopes on a bonus for your troubles.