Looking back at the year that was, it’s impossible to overlook the continuous flow of global law firms into the Australian market.

While Baker & McKenzie was first on the scene way back in 1964, in 2011 the globalisation of the Australian legal industry well and truly gained momentum.

In just a year, the Australian legal industry was hit with the news that the UK’s Clifford Chance and Ashurst, and the United States’ Squire Sanders and DLA Piper, would forge their way into the Australian market to join Baker & McKenzie, Holman Fenwick Willan, Jones Day, Allen & Overy and Norton Rose on Australian shores.

“The scale of the change does not surprise me at all. What does and has surprised me is the pace of the change,” Allen & Overy managing partner Grant Fuzi told Lawyers Weekly.

“I thought it would play out over a three to five-year horizon, but it’s clearly playing out quite quickly.”

And, in 2012, more arrivals are expected.

Just this month, rumours of a tie-up between Mallesons Stephen Jaques and China-based international firm King & Wood were verified, with Mallesons confirming on 16 December that the partnerships of both firms had voted in favour of the proposed union, to become King & Wood Mallesons, effective 1 March 2012.

With the news that Mallesons will join the global firm ranks comes further speculation as to which Australian firms will be next, with all eyes on Australia’s remaining national firms, such as Freehills, Minter Ellison, Allens Arthur Robinson and Gilbert + Tobin.

“My prediction is one more major play in 2012. I don’t know what that play will look like, but I think there will be one more big movement in the ranks,” says Fuzi.

While more global arrivals are a certainty in 2012, the arrival of Clifford Chance this year was a nod to A&O’s entry the year before. Clifford Chance merged with boutique firms Chang, Pistilli & Simmons in Sydney and Cochrane Lishman Carson Luscombe in Perth, targeting high-end work across the banking and finance, M&A, and energy and resources sectors.

Closeley watching how Norton Rose and Allen & Overy entered Australia, Clifford Chance’s Asia head Peter Charlton told Lawyers Weekly why he decided on his fi rm’s merger model.

“I thought, ‘I can do a raid on a firm, but I will get the same result as A&O, with a mix of some people that are good, bad and indifferent’,” he said. “Then I thought, ‘I will cherry pick three from here, three from there, one or two from here and there’, and found it would be very, very, hard.

“You would have different cultures and people that don’t know each other. It might work if you are lucky, but nine times out of 10, you are unlucky.”

In contrast to the hype surrounding Clifford Chance’s arrival, DLA Piper’s Australian entry in 2011 was relatively low-key, despite a significant number of DLA Phillips Fox partners walking away from the global firm. Adding to the list of global arrivals in 2011 was US firm Squire Sanders, setting up shop in Perth, with the help of 14 Minter Ellison partners.

Finally, following months of speculation, Blake Dawson and UK firm Ashurst made an announcement in September of their plans to merge by 2014, combining their businesses under the Ashurst brand.

With Mallesons to merge with King & Wood early next year and speculation rife as to which national firm will be next, 2012 is set to be a very interesting year.