As another firm officially opens its doors in Brisbane today, lawyers explain what is behind the northern legal market’s growth spurt.
Specialist employment firm People + Culture Strategies officially opens its new Brisbane office today.
“Brisbane has been doing quite well for the last decade as an economy, it’s certainly growing, there’s a lot of infrastructure growth,” said Joydeep Hor, founder and managing principal of PCS.
People + Culture Strategies is not the only firm with a Sydney and Melbourne presence to look to the north for new opportunities. In the past year, Lander & Rogers,
Nexus Lawyers, Clyde & Co and Baker & McKenzie have all expanded to the sunshine state.
With the Brisbane economy now worth $135bn and with around 22,000 jobs created in the city over the last 12 months, it is no wonder there has been an influx of law firms.
Along with agribusiness, Brisbane’s newest legal inhabitants listed infrastructure, energy and resources and property as the biggest areas of opportunity.
Baker & McKenzie opened up its doors in Brisbane last year, following increasing client demand for an office in Queensland. Philip Christensen, who leads the firm’s Brisbane office, said the need to open an office in Brisbane came from both client demand and increasing referrals from other offices.
“We see Queensland as a state with a growing economy; we had been servicing it for some time out of our Sydney office,” Christensen said. “Ultimately the pressure from our clients in Australia, and interestingly many of our overseas offices, were saying that to be really effective on the east coast of Australia, we really do need to open an office in Brisbane.”
