European-international firm CMS Cameron McKenna has become the first law firm to outsource its entire business support function after agreeing a £600m deal with Integreon, reported The Lawyer magazine today:

The game-changing agreement will see the top 20 firm sublet a floor of its City HQ to Integreon and transfer as many as 200 support staff into the newly created service centre.

Director of operations Tony Wright, who has been leading the deal, will be seconded to Integreon from the start of June while the two parties undertake a three-month due diligence process.

Camerons plans to roll the model out across the full CMS network with all nine European firms expected to sign up within three to four years, according to managing partner Duncan Weston. The service will subsequently be made available to other law firms.

Outsourced functions will include IT, HR, finance, business development, communications, knowledge management, facilities management and administration services.

Weston said: “It’s one of the core pillars of our strategy. We hope that this is something that transforms the sector.

"The difference with this is that we’re the first firm to market a complete service platform for the industry."

The partnership will see Camerons help Integreon develop its new service, although the firm will not put any equity into the project.

Wright added: "With the investment that comes from focusing on that as a core business we get a service that’s better than any back office law firm can deliver themselves."

Last year, Osborne Clarke signed a similar agreement with Integreon that saw 75 per cent of its back office functions taken over by the outsourcer, but the Camerons partnership is thought to be around ten times the size.

Integreon's president of global sales John Croft said: "We’ve been building up to this moment for 10 years. One of the things we’ve found is that few law firms want to be the first to do things, but the way they’re structured we felt that change like this was inevitable."

Integreon operates legal process outsourcing (LPO) and business process outsourcing (BPO) service centres in India, South Africa and the Phillippines.