Dimas Cuesta Montejano, Partner at Lexland Lawyers

The British Chamber of Commerce o�ers us incredible networking opportunities“ ”

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Lexland Lawyer was founded in 2005 from the merger of four large Spanish �rms with over 35 years of experience. Lexand Lawyers is one of the largest law �rms on the Costa del Sol considering the number of lawyers and the turnover. With more than 27.000 �les, Lexland has become one of the leading and reputable �rms in the �eld.

They o�er a full service law �rm. Every professional in their team is specialized in a particular �eld of law, allowing Lexland to cover all areas of the Spanish legal system. Moreover, their multilingual professional team speaks more than 10 languages, being able to advise clients from practically anywhere in the world in their own language and with a deep understanding of their cultural background.

They also have several associate o�ces in several countries, including Italy, Sweden, UAE and the UK among others. Furthermore, in the UK in particular they have established close collaborations with some of the top �rms over the past few years. One such example would be a FTSE 100 company - St. James’ Place Wealth Management. They are the only law �rm in Spain that is recommended by St. James’ Place.

Our main goal for the future is to keep on

expanding our professional network

and increase our presence in the national and

international markets

Could you give us a brief overview about Lexland ans its business? For many years, the Marbella o�ce had an o�ce in Lincoln’s Inn as well as its own o�ce in Casablanca, in addition to the national o�ces in Madrid, Barcelona and Seville. Large Clients now have a deeper understanding of the legal industry and they do not necessarily see it as a adavantage to work with large national Law Firms as the coordination between o�ces is the same, when if not worse, than the coordination, you could achieve dealing with truly independent o�ces. Today we work as a truly independent o�ce with the advantage of choosing the best o�ce based on the circumstances of the case and the Client and not based on the fact of belonging to a network or organization. There are great boutique specialized o�ces that are a better and cheaper option for the Clients most of the time. We feel that our deep understanding of the market and the freedom to be able to choose the collaborator o�ce based on the circumstances of the project brings more value to the Client than belonging to a large network or organization with exclusive rights.We are currently working with several specialized Law Firms, whom we select depending on the required expertise and the type of Client we need to serve. We are convinced that it is di�cult to belong to any form of international network of o�ces with a relationship of exclusivity, like the ones you will �nd in the largest Law Firms, and always �nd the best professionals for all the cases within that network. Getting the right partner to work a case is essential and we can´t restrict ourselves to one network or organization. If we wish to serve and protect the best interest of the Client at all times, we need to be truly independent. We need to be able to choose our collaborators based on the best interest of the Client and the project not an exclusivity agreement. You cannot do that if you belong to a large organization with several o�ces or if you are part of a network that requires exclusivity.

Could you tell us a relevant project that Lexland is now developing in Spain?We advise from very large corporations to Private Clients. From a Private Client perspective, we have advised many important football players and artists in the entertainment industry. In relation to corporations that may be more familiar to the public, we have advised Arsenal FC and other real estate projects in Spain known as “The Village”, which receive a lot of media coverage. We also advise a great number of large corporations in the Tourism and

Hospitality industry on the Costa del Sol, such as “La Sala Group”. Furthermore, we also work closely with FTSE 100 companies, for instance, Saint James’ Place Wealth Management, for whom we help design a new �nancial product from a legal and �scal perspective for its expatriate market residing in Spain. From the IT and Start-up Law perspective we are advising Job and Talent, which has subsidiaries in the UK and other countries. This year, they have completed one of the largest rounds of �nance in Spain. The community think they have the potential to be the �rst Spanish unicorn (Billion dollar company) and it seems they are in the good path.

How does the British Chamber of Commerce in Spain helps to your business? The BCCS is one of the most important private institutions in relation to Anglo-Spanish investments and trade relationships. As such it is important to somehow be involved and work together with such an organization. There are many advantages of being a Member of the Chamber. One of them is the incredible networking opportunities that the Chamber o�ers through their events. Years of collaboration with the Chamber have helped Lexland become more visible within the Costa del Sol and promote our business to some of the key players in the area.

Commercial activity between Spain and United Kingdom is very important for both countries, but what are the favourable factors that Lexland sees? From a Private Client perspective, there is a large UK expatriate community in Spain, the largest in Europe and third largest in the world, which can be seen as one of the fundamental positive or indeed negative factors. It is really important for us to understand the reasons and trends linked to either shrinkage or expansion of this community. Obviously, we also take into account macro-economic factors like currency exchange and the general state of the economy of both countries.

What are Lexland’s expectations for the near future? Our main goal for the near future is to expand and strengthen our focus on our three main industries: Real Estate, New Technologies and Tourism/Hospitality. We also expect substantial growth from our Private Client practice, which is becoming increasingly renowned. The New Technologies and Start-up industries is also an important industry for us as we have substantial expertise when it comes to advising important and successful Start-ups, business angels, seeding and capital venture companies.

Last question, how has the economic crisis a�ected your business? It was not easy but the truth is that we have thrived during the crisis. Being a full service Law Firm has allowed us to grow quickly in other areas of expertise, where we already had substantial experience, for example, insolvency and litigation. These areas were highly demanded during the crisis in industries were we already had important Clients like Real Estate. We did more than compensate the decrease in other areas of practice due to the general inertia of growth that our company has been experimenting since its foundation. We have experienced a consistent double-digit growth since the incorporation of the Law Firm including the economic crisis years.

Dimas Cuesta Montejano, Partner at Lexland Lawyers

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