The question of whether you should allow external law firms to advise your company’s competitors can be a difficult call.
On the one hand, most in-house lawyers are keen for their outside counsel to build up sector expertise. With that expertise, so the theory goes, comes a better understanding of the key issues at stake and a higher quality of advice in the long run.
This sector expertise is particularly important in those areas of the business that can genuinely be considered to be cutting edge, where the number of companies and outside law firms with relevant experience are often extremely limited.
