Queensland’s HopgoodGanim and Perth’s Q Legal have announced a merger which will see the firms operating under the HopgoodGanim name from 1 November. The new firm will have 30 partners and 240 staff in total and HopgoodGanim’s Bruce Humphrys will be managing partner of the combined entity.
Q Legal currently has three partners but Humphrys told ALB that the combined firm would aim to provide the full range of services in Perth and that it was possible the Perth operation could double in size in the first year. “If it’s sustainable and makes good business sense, then sometimes the [pace of] growth can surprise you,” he said. “But in meantime let’s not put the cart before the horse - talk is cheap. The driver has to be clients, not ego trips or trying to be as big as firm A or firm B. We’ll grow and we’ll grow naturally.”
Humphrys confirmed that HopgoodGanim had not been the only firm pursuing Q Legal and indeed HopgoodGanim itself had been a target. “Q Legal are like us – they had been courted by others in the eastern states,” he said. “But like us, Q Legal were just not interested on being on the end of [someone else’s] strategy . Here we felt we could both be in control of our own destiny but be able to do it with like-minded people.”
HopgoodGanim has had ties with the Perth market for some time. “A lot of our clients are either based in Perth or have operations in Western Australia. Joining forces with Q Legal enables us to meet the needs of emerging and growth-oriented mining, resources and energy clients. We can now better service our existing client base, in addition to the broader Western Australian and Queensland markets outside of the resources industry,” said Humphrys.
HopgoodGanim has continued to grow in its home market in Brisbane. Last financial year, the firm added nine additional fee earners to its overall headcount and grew revenues by six percent.
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