Interview with: Wouter Ghijsels & David Orobio de Castro , Managing Partners Brussels and Amsterdam

What do you see as the main points that differentiate Stibbe from your competitors?

Stibbe is a full service independent Benelux law firm with main offices in Brussels, Amsterdam and Luxembourg and branch offices in London and New York.

Our independent position ensures that we always deliver the best services to our clients by teaming up with the referral partner within our extensive network who will be best placed to assess the specificities of the matter at stake in its jurisdiction.

In addition to outstanding legal experience, our multidisciplinary teams understand clients’ commercial objectives, their position in the market and their sector or industry, which allow us to render the most tailored and pragmatic advice possible. We maintain close business relationships with our clients, who count on us to deliver the hands-on, step-by-step advice they need on their most strategic operations.

Which practices do you see growing in the next 12 months? What are the drivers behind that?

The firm is growing as a whole, and the lateral hires and promotions of the past year across the Benelux are a testament to that. Overall, we have had an increasingly successful year across all practices.

Our Corporate and M&A practice benefited from the M&A market picking up in the third and fourth quarters of 2020. Other growing practices are Compliance and Sanctions, Environment (especially EU regulatory and health and safety regulations) , Energy (especially digital and green energy projects) and Real Estate (logistics and data centres, warehouses). We also see an increase in (Alternative) Dispute Resolution matters in the Benelux, with arbitration being particularly on the rise. Our top-tier Litigation and ADR teams have attracted a number of important disputes, some of which entail novel questions stemming from the COVID-19 crisis.

What’s the main change you’ve made in the firm that will benefit clients?

The already fast-paced digitalization of our offer has substantially evolved, allowing our clients and workforce to benefit from increasingly innovative solutions and initiatives. We had already been investing in adequate and robust IT infrastructure prior to the outbreak of the pandemic, which allowed both our lawyers and business services to seamlessly adapt to remote working overnight without any disruption in the delivery of our services to clients. Furthermore, we organize trainings in creative problem-solving and on efficient ways of channeling energy. Stibbe is also proud to support initiatives that foster diversity, which is why we were one of the founding members of the Legal Diversity and Inclusion Alliance. We believe that a diverse, inclusive, and supportive culture promotes creativity, innovation, and inspiration and these will contribute not only to the success professional career of our people, and, by consequence, to the success of our clients. That’s why we are taking concrete actions to turn innovation and inclusion from a skill-set into a mind-set for our people, and we believe that this will only add to the benefits that our clients can expect from Stibbe.

Is technology changing the way you interact with your clients, and the services you can provide them?

We already extensively used technology in our interaction with clients, and we continue to invest in the digitalization of our office and in solutions to automate our business operations further and better.

Our IT infrastructure and applications continually evolve and we continuously look for the best technologies in the market.

Stibbe has also heavily invested in cyber security measures over the past few years. Implementing a Managed Security services strategy allows us to focus on our core business and to keep a peace of mind when it comes to the tech environment through which we deliver our services.

Can you give us a practical example of how you have helped a client to add value to their business?

Building close business relationships with our clients, understanding their commercial objectives, their position in the market and their sector or industry, allows us to render suitable, effective and strategic advice.

Are clients looking for stability and strategic direction from their law firms – where do you see the firm in three years’ time?

As an independent Benelux law firm, we are able to provide our clients with high-end legal services. The goal of everything we do is to render the most beneficial and tailor-made advice to our clients. Thanks this approach and to our excellent relationships with leading international firms, we have increasingly been on the receiving end of big ticket cross-border mandates, which we reasonably expect to increase in the near future.