Hi and welcome to the April Orange Rag, where it’s been an interesting month for big CIO announcements: Christopher Smith took on the CIO role at magic circle giant Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer (as we first revealed at the start of the month), and Ash Banerjee was appointed as global CIO at Dentons.
Smith was originally brought in as a consultant by former IT chief Charlotte Baldwin, to help evaluate Freshfields’ existing tech stack and attitudes to IT across the firm. The appointment of a New York-based CIO cannot be viewed as coincidental, and Smith told me: “It signifies that we’re global and is a testament to the firm’s commitment to the United States.” Don’t miss that full interview below.
Banerjee, who was previously Hogan Lovells’ chief information officer and chief operating officer for the Americas region, joined Dentons in 2021 in an interim capacity. He will report to Dentons’ global CEO Elliott Portnoy and will sit on the firm’s global management committee. You can read more about that in our Movers and Shakers section for North America.
Elsewhere, Litera has also brought in a new CEO with the hire of Sheryl Hoskins, with incumbent CEO Avaneesh Marwaha to step into a new role as chairman of the board. Hoskins, who spent the first decade of her career at General Electric and McKesson Corp, most recently served as CEO of Upserve. Litera should be commended on its strong female leadership, including global director of business development and strategy Haley Altman, and new chief product officer Meredith Johnson.
And on the deals front Peppermint Technology has won one of its biggest deals to date, signing up UK top 25 law firm Irwin Mitchell for client relationship management, case management, and document management. According to iManage and Irwin Mitchell, iManage Work 10 is being retained, and you can read more on that in our top stories.
Please keep your news and commentary coming, all our contact details are at the end of the newsletter.