A description of the PLC Corporate service.
Click here or call 020 7202 1220 to register your interest in a free trial.
PLC Corporate provides know-how on a range of topics including:
Company law.
Corporate transactions.
Corporate governance.
Equity capital markets.
Partnership law.
Developments in related practice areas (such as tax, competition, employment, employee benefits, pensions, insolvency and intellectual property) are covered to the extent that they have a significant impact on corporate transactions.
The service is run by Practical Law Company's team of corporate law specialists, who have extensive experience of corporate and commercial law in practice, though they are currently not practising. They are supported by a consultation board of leading professional experts.
For a full explanation of the scope of the PLC Corporate service see PLC Corporate: scope of service (www.practicallaw.com/A20696).
Updates are delivered by e-mail, on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. Our information team use sophisticated technology which continuously monitors over 1700 web pages and our updates cover:
Proposed, draft and new UK and EC legislation and regulations.
Significant new cases (both UK and ECJ).
Changes in market practice.
Consultation papers from the EC, UK government and other relevant bodies.
Updates are layered to meet differing needs, with an abstract, speed-read and full text and links to related materials affected by the development.
They are written by our professional support team (www.practicallaw.com/3-200-5933) who monitor and review all relevant sources daily for relevance. Unlike other services we do not simply pass on raw information. We focus on the needs of the busy practitioner and only report on developments which are of practical significance:
Updates include relevant background information where necessary and always start with a summary and analyse the practical impact of developments.
Updates are complete in themselves but include hypertext links to source materials (including transcripts for new cases), other updates and practice notes where appropriate.
Our practice notes and standard documents are also updated as developments occur.
The updates can be integrated with subscribers' internal briefings and marketing materials.
For an example see UKLA guidance notes: new and amended technical and procedural notes (www.practicallaw.com/3-522-5762).
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer collaborated with Practical Law Company to provide a “100% solution” in respect of generic current awareness. For full details, see Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer case study (www.practicallaw.com/A39720).
Practice notes are continuously maintained, concise and up to date notes which discuss and explain corporate law and its practical application to particular transactions or sectors. For experienced lawyers, they provide up-to-date and reliable statements of law and practice, while junior lawyers can use them to gain an understanding of relevant areas not yet acquired through practice.
Overview notes are ideal for lawyers to gain an understanding of areas outside their specialist areas, for example, Share purchases: tax overview (www.practicallaw.com/2-372-4999) and Limited liability partnerships (LLP): overview (www.practicallaw.com/4-107-3913).
Toolkits and guides to PLC materials bring together relevant materials and documents relating to specific transactions or areas of law, for example, A toolkit for private share acquisitions (www.practicallaw.com/4-501-6070) and A guide to PLC's UK corporate governance materials (www.practicallaw.com/3-502-1005).
Know how indices provide access to a range of know-how on a given topic. For example, Takeover Code know-how index (www.practicallaw.com/4-384-3897) covers know–how and Takeover Panel practice relating to the Takeover Code Rules, on a Rule by Rule basis. Each of the notes in the index includes links to documents which may help interpret the relevant Rules. Examples of know-how covered include relevant Takeover Panel Practice Statements issued by the Panel Executive, selected Panel annual reports, Panel consultation papers and response statements, Panel Statements and PLC materials, see, for example, Rule 2: Secrecy before announcements; the timing and contents of announcements (www.practicallaw.com/7-384-3891).
The service includes a library of continuously maintained standard documents, clauses and checklists for corporate and commercial transactions, for example, Share purchase agreement: multiple individual sellers: non-simultaneous exchange and completion (www.practicallaw.com/3-107-5026).
The standard documents and clauses are accompanied by drafting notes which give detailed guidance on the relevant legal, drafting and negotiating issues. These may be integrated, for example, Share purchase agreement: multiple individual sellers: non-simultaneous exchange and completion (www.practicallaw.com/3-107-5026) or take the form of separate notes, for example, Asset purchase agreement: drafting note (www.practicallaw.com/0-107-5018).
The standard documents are available in Microsoft 6.0 format. They include logical styles and automated numbering, table of contents and cross-referencing (see How do I use the PLC Word template? (www.practicallaw.com/A16094) ). Practical Law Company has developed an application allowing Practical Law Company standard documents to be downloaded in a firm's style, saving substantial time for fee-earners and secretaries. For more information, see PLC Firmstyle (www.practicallaw.com/A30700).
The PLC Corporate homepage gives access to a list of standard documents and standard clauses currently available.
The service includes tables monitoring progress of pieces of EU and UK legislation that are of particular interest to corporate and commercial practitioners, for example Corporate governance: key developments tracker (www.practicallaw.com/9-501-8811).
What's Market is a deals database that lets you search and compare a wide range of public company transactions, including public M&A, secondary issues, IPOs and significant reorganisations. What's Market covers transactions by Main Market and AIM companies that fall within our scope. What’s Market can be used to:
Search for details of recent deals.
Review search results and browse deal terms.
Compare features and deal terms across a range of deals and sectors.
Save deal comparisons to Word or Excel
Access certain public documents (for example announcements and circulars).
What's Market also contains summaries of AGM notices and business for FTSE 350 and certain AIM trading companies.
Using the What's Market data base, PLC identifies and analyses current trends, see Annual reporting and AGMs 2012: FTSE 350: What's Market practice? (www.practicallaw.com/4-522-5525) and Public M&A: Trends and highlights from 2012 (www.practicallaw.com/3-523-2625). Details of recent deals added to What's Market can be accessed from Practice note, Recent deals published on What's Market (www.practicallaw.com/6-503-8066).
The service provides access to the entire contents of every issue of PLC Magazine ever published since its launch in 1990. Feature articles can be read on screen in simple text or PDF format, complete with graphics. The service is updated monthly with the current issue of the magazine. The PLC magazine contents page can be received monthly by e-mail, enabling subscribers to click through direct to the relevant articles on the website.
For a comprehensive note of the new resources added to PLC Corporate over the last 12 months, see PLC Corporate: new content (www.practicallaw.com/A29222).
The service is delivered through a web site using advanced technology specifically developed by Practical Law Company to provide a seamless source of managed know-how to the practitioner in an easy to access form:
Searching. All the text is fully searchable. Searches can be done across all material or restricted to selected types of material (for example, standard documents only) or to a specified time period.
Index. Alternatively information can be accessed via the core topic headings on the PLC corporate homepage or via the PLC Corporate index.
Links. Frequent hypertext links guide users to further Practical Law Company materials and external sources.
Integration. Subscribers can integrate their own know-how materials closely with those of the service, whilst maintaining confidentiality. For further information, please contact your account manager, or call the PLC helpline (www.practicallaw.com/7-102-1343).
The Practical Law Company professional support team comprises over 210 experienced former practitioners and paralegals covering a wide range of law, to view their profiles see PLC professional support team (www.practicallaw.com/4-103-0546). For details of the members of the team with experience relevant to the Corporate service, see PLC Corporate professional support team (www.practicallaw.com/3-200-5933).
The service has a consultation board of leading experts. They advise on the direction of the service and are used as a sounding board on points of law and practice. To view members of the consultation board, see PLC Corporate consultation board (www.practicallaw.com/1-200-5934).
The service is a cost-effective tool for any lawyer, solicitor or barrister, in private practice, in-house or otherwise.
It helps:
Save lawyers' time and enhance their capacity to do fee-earning or client-related work.
Improve the quality, speed and accuracy of the service to clients.
Bring trainees and recently qualified staff up to speed quickly and effectively.
Allow firms and legal departments with professional support lawyers to focus resources and time on firm and client specific know-how, and finding innovative solutions to new transaction problems instead of routine information gathering.
Concentrate more attention on using know-how for marketing purposes and making the practice more competitive.
Attract, maintain and motivate good lawyers.
Subscribers to PLC Corporate include the top 50 UK law firms and 86 of the FT-SE 100. Subscribing organisations include:
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"We expect all our commercial and transaction lawyers to use PLC Corporate. Frankly, I would be surprised if our external law firms and other blue chip in-house departments did not take the same view."
Clive Grant, Associate General Counsel, Shell Chemicals.
"We find the documents and drafting notes to be of a very high quality practical and focused on the needs of front line fee-earners."
Larry Nathan, Partner, Mishcon de Reya.
"Absolutely tremendous. PLC has come up with the gold standard again. PLC Corporate law saves money and adds value at the same time. Navigation around the site is superb and the underlying material is extremely valuable.”
Steven Weatherley, Head of group review & audit, Scottish & Newcastle plc
"PLC Corporate provides a most valuable addition to our existing know-how system which is accessed through our intranet, helping us to compete on equal terms with the best firms out there."
Stephen Williams, Partner, Cripps Harries Hall
For further information please contact our sales department on the Practical Law Company Helpline. (www.practicallaw.com/A17385)
