From Legal Services Directory:
Craig Johnson, the Silicon Valley lawyer-entrepreneur who brought you the Venture Law Group, is on to his next big thing: a virtual law firm. Johnson and 14 other lawyers unveiled the new firm, called Virtual Law Partners, on Friday. The idea is to have more work-life balance, work from home, save on overhead, charge clients less, and forge a new model for the legal industry. They’re also getting rid of minimum billable hour requirements and high-priced associates.
From the Virtual Law Partners colorful Web site:
CLIENT BENEFITS
We designed VLP to be better for clients. Here's how:
Better Legal Cost Control: We give our clients the ability to monitor their legal costs much more closely than conventional law firms. Our attorneys enter their time at least weekly, and their time is immediately posted to your password-protected MyVLP homepage. You can view the accrued charges on each of your projects, together with detailed descriptions of the services provided (no more billing surprises or delays).
More Experienced Attorneys: Our lawyers all worked at top law firms and graduated from the best law schools. They have at least five years’ work experience and often much more. You will never pay to train a new lawyer when you work with VLP. All of our lawyers are partners. We have no associates. Projects typically assigned to young associates are instead completed by highly trained "legal specialists," who also have at least five years of relevant work experience.
Lower Billing Rates: Our rates are less than the rates of lawyers with comparable experience at large law firms, due to our lower overhead. We'll also do projects on a "flat fee" basis if you prefer and if we agree on a fair arrangement.
Rest here.
From an article in the ABA Journal "Law News Now":
A lawyer-entrepreneur is joining with 14 other lawyers to start a new legal venture called Virtual Law Partners.
The firm will employ lawyers who work at home, saving on overhead and costing clients less in legal fees, the Recorder reports. Craig Johnson, the lawyer who formed the Venture Law Group in 1993, told the publication that the typical large law firm business model is “a situation that can’t continue.” That business model includes high associate salaries, prestigious offices and billing rates as high as $800 an hour, he said.
His Virtual Law Partners “just seems like an idea whose time has come," he said. He hopes to employ hundreds of lawyers working from home doing all kinds of legal work for companies, except for litigation. Johnson, who will be CEO of the new firm, estimates that the average billing rate will be about $400 an hour and says lawyers will get 85 percent of what they bill. There will be no billable hour requirements.
Stephanie:
This idea is interesting, but not new at all. A firm here in Atlanta has the same business model - work from home-offices or from the client's space, save on overhead and charge clients less. In fact I was recently speaking with the founder and he explained their elevator pitch - they provide partner level attorneys for BigLaw first-year rates. Even lower than current Atlanta first-year rates at some of the BigLaw firms.
Posted by: Chris Annunziata | July 16, 2008 at 08:45 AM
This sounds a lot like Katovich Law Group, a bay area firm that has been operating in exactly the same way for years
Posted by: greenlawyer | July 17, 2008 at 11:32 PM