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Competency trumps sycophancy.
But certain less relevant aspects which is often overlooked by others is -
1. Highly Meritocratic - No family/caste has power over governance of Trilegal.
Infact the founders doesn't have anything in common except the fact that they are corporate lawyers that too in different areas of practice. 5 founders of Trilegal vary from a Malayalee Christian to Uttar Pradesh Brahmin.
Wheras all other big law firms in India - one family/caste has all the power.
Most big firms - Former AMSS (SAM, CAM) AZB, Luthra etc are either controlled by one strong man/family/caste.
At one point of time (hearsay) Trilegal even used to discourage/kick out people marrying/dating within the same firm because they want to be ultra professional whereas many other firms (AMSS) were very tolerant of the same.
Only other firm which is meritocratic is JSA - in Trilegal's case the firm doesn't even have a name based on founder.
While this might not be a USP in advanced market like US/Europe. It definitely is a big deal in India.
Merit actually works. It's easier to attract the best people when you can show them that what matters is how capable they are.
2. Zero Connections / Clean Image -
Most big law firms in India are heavily politically/family wise commented (CAM - Adani - BJP) AZB (Parsi - Wealth)
Most Trilegal founders or top lawyers didn't have any good connections compared to legacy firms.
Trilegal also avoids Sketchy politically connected clients. They avoid naked lobbying, political influencing etc.
This means they are attractive for clients in western markets where fcpa, ukba is a big deal for whom clean image is important. A western GC would consider that Trilegal is a clean firm.
This is what used to happen in China, Brazil etc. Western GC's prefer giving work to law firms without much political connects just for this clean image.
Many other big firms (Cyril Amarchand, Nishith Desai etc) have even gotten raided by authorities. Just go through a simple Google search.
Political connects are a double edged sword.
3. Wannabe 'Healthy Workspace'
Many other law firms including founders are proud that the office they created is a toxic mess.
Trilegal maybe as bad as AZB/CAM/Khaitan when it comes to hours and culture.
But founders/management do put some serious effort into changing the image. Even thou it's useless stunt. Atleast the message is clear.
Trilegal doesn't take pride in toxicity. Infact they even sends stunt emails to stop partners from yelling, shouting etc.
4. Indian Economy goes burrrrrrrrr
Trilegal was founded in 2000s. Past 20 + years Indian economy was on caffeine. After LPG reforms - Trilegal started at the right time when FDI was flowing into India. India was supposed to be China 2 (which never happened)
In China, in 1980s there were not even a single law firm. But in 2015 the biggest Chinese law firm (Snr Denton) have 7000+ lawyers and around a billion dollar in revenues. Because Chinese economy was on steroids.
Same happened in India, but on a small scale.
5. Lockstep Equity Model -
Trilegal doesn't have an eat what you kill model. They follow Lockstep equity - while this has disadvantages (making some partners lazy) people who work there are deeply invested for the long term due to this compensation structure.
Disadvantage - Trilegal lost Nisha Kaur Oberoi to JSA where the billing model is the latter. Trilegal still could loose more rainmakers to firms like JSA.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaya_Jaitly
I could go on and state (just top of my head) at least 10 examples of partners who are well connected/ privileged and made it big at Tri.
Fine, admitted that it runs unlike a lala firm
But note that nothing is a true meritocracy. No law firm. It’s just not possible. Trilegal partners have sheltered and promoted promoted plenty of family members and kids who come with decent connections to get the firm more business. Having said that, they have also promoted some who come from nothing and have made it to the ranks based on just talent and luck.
But please get your facts checked before you make such bold claims.
Maybe Trilegal rose 100% because of Akshay's talent. Maybe he never used any connections at all. But facts are facts.