IP firm Lall & Sethi moves from Sole Proprietorship to Partnership model, Promotes 3 to Equity

Twenty years after it was formed, Delhi-based IP boutique firm Lall & Sethi has moved to a partnership model promoting three of its Senior Associates Raghav Malik, Jyotideep Kaur and Tia Malik to equity partnership..All three of the newly promoted partners have been working with the firm for more than 7 years. Another Senior Associate Naval Kastia, who was up for promotion, has recently moved to Coca-Cola as Trade Mark Counsel for the INSWA (India & South West Asia) region..Raghav Malik has been elected as the Managing Partner of the firm. The firm has decided to have a rotating Managing Partner while Chander M. Lall (pictured) will continue to be the Founding Partner..Speaking to Bar & Bench about this development, Chander M. Lall said, “We are quite a large firm and we do diverse kinds of work. It is definitely not a one-man show and these lawyers have been handling work for a long time now. We had been grooming them for the last 3-4 years by giving them independent charge of specific clients as portfolio managers. They very much deserve this position.”.He further said, “I am confident that the infusion of young blood as partners in the firm will take the firm to the next level of growth and efficiency.”.Lall said, “Another significant aspect of the partnership is that we want to build a professionally run firm and we don’t want a family run firm where my children succeed me. No one from the family can be admitted as Partner in the firm unless all the Equity Partners unanimously agree to the same.”.Lall feels that if you have the possibility of progenies coming in, it discourages others. Secondly, he says, “I don’t believe it is healthy for children to be joining their father’s practice at all. My father was a leading attorney and I didn’t practice with him. An Attorney’s job is very individualistic and you have to be very competent as an individual.”.Talking about expansion plans, Lall said, “We already have offices in Nepal and Sri Lanka. We will expand to other countries and we might consider opening an office in Myanmar but we do not plan to open offices in other cities in India as we mostly have foreign clients.”.Lall also spoke about the proprietary software ‘Click IPR’, an IP firm management software, which the firm developed last year for lawyers, in-house legal teams and law firms. He said, “We are very excited about this software and we plan to extensively market that.”.Bithika Anand, Founder & CEO of Legal League Consulting, who facilitated this conversion, said, “Partnerships are integral part of strategic thinking, fuelling growth. This step by Chander is one of its kind and has the potential of revolutionizing the way Indian Founding Partners will take their firms forward.”