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ALTERNATIVE FEE ARRANGEMENTS

HKW believes that, while hourly billing remains the norm, alternative fee arrangements that better align the interests of clients and lawyers are the way of the future. We are unique among law firms in our willingness to break the status quo and offer non-traditional fee agreements that are more predictable than the “billable hour” model and better reflect the value placed on our services by our clients. For most transactional matters HKW can usually offer flat or mixed flat and hourly fee arrangements that often better accommodate our clients’ needs. HKW’s philosophy is that each client is different, and while the amount of time spent on a project is one factor that affects the cost of legal services, it often is not at all indicative of the value provided to the client. In many situations, our flexible fee arrangements offer stronger value to the client, better align the client’s and the firm’s interests, keep fees tied to the results obtained for the client, and allow the client to forecast costs for a project and budget accordingly.

The primary alternative fee arrangements that we offer are:

Recurring Monthly Flat Fee for Dedicated Outside Counsel Services

Our "Dedicated Outside Counsel" offering is a flat monthly fee service that allows a company to outsource an in-house general or corporate counsel role to HKW on a cost effective basis instead of hiring a full time employee with limited skills and experience. Very often, a company will hire an in-house lawyer, only to realize that the lawyer only possesses experience in a specialized area of the law and lacks real world business experience. As a result, the inexperienced in-house lawyer must continue to rely on more experienced outside counsel to assist with many matters and the company continues to pay fees for outside counsel in addition to the cost of hiring an inexperienced in-house lawyer. Because our attorneys collectively have a much wider range and depth of experience, for the same or lower cost to hire an in-house lawyer, we provide our business clients with experienced, high level general counsel services along with access to a much broader set of firm wide skills than any one lawyer can provide.

One of the main benefits of this monthly arrangement is that the client has constant access to the legal advice it needs, without having to worry about being billed for every phone call, e-mail or day-to-day legal issue that arises. Our flat fee approach builds trust and truly allows the lawyer and the client to act as partners working toward the same goal by freeing both sides from the constant issue of how much the lawyer’s services are costing on a minute-by-minute basis.

HKW has used the Dedicated Outside Counsel arrangement with great success for several corporate clients, generally falling into two main categories:

Outsourced General or Corporate Counsel – This offering is appropriate for a smaller, growing business that wants to establish a sophisticated general counsel and in-house legal function for a reasonable, predictable cost. The service is intended to provide comprehensive day-to-day legal and business strategy / policymaking support to the company’s board of directors and executive management, as well as routine legal support for all of the company’s functional areas, such as sales, human resources, finance, information technology and operations. HKW’s lawyers have broad business experience and understand the management role of in-house counsel and the need to manage the use and cost of legal subject matter specialists to make the best use of the company’s limited resources. » View More Information

Dedicated / Overflow Counsel – This offering is often appropriate for a larger company that has a legal department, but needs to fill a specific, dedicated need, or has occasional needs for extra capacity that do not justify an additional full-time employee.

For instance, a client’s general counsel might find that HKW’s deep experience in handling routine commercial and large licensing, outsourcing and other information technology contracts or intellectual property matters will better meet an ongoing need than hiring one or more full time in-house lawyers. For example, HKW might be engaged as “Information Technology Counsel” for the company, with responsibility for providing all legal support to the company’s IT department and handling all IT related legal issues, while all other ongoing legal needs are met by full time in-house lawyers.

Other examples of specific roles HKW’s lawyers fill for clients include Intellectual Property Counsel (including patent and trademark prosecution, IP litigation and IP portfolio management), Corporate Finance and Securities Counsel, Telecommunications Contract Counsel, International Counsel, Litigation Counsel and Tax Counsel. » View More Information

Flat Project-Based Fees

Under a typical flat-fee arrangement, HKW works on a specific, non-recurring legal matter for a predetermined fee, regardless of the number of hours actually expended. HKW has used flat-fee arrangements for mergers and acquisitions, loan transactions, venture capital financings, patent and trademark applications and licensing matters, preparation of standard commercial contracts, such as software licenses and service agreements or distribution and sales contracts, as well as a variety of other business contracts and corporate transactions as dictated by our clients’ needs.

Recurring Transactions

For companies that need legal assistance with recurring transactions, such as distribution agreements, patent trademark applications, software licenses, leases, and other commercial matters, but do not have a steady, known volume that requires dedicated legal support, we can offer a flat fee per transaction in exchange for our client’s agreement to utilize our services for all transactions as they arise.

Always Open to Novel Fee Arrangements

We recognize that no two clients have the same legal needs and are always willing to work with our clients to find alternative fee arrangements that meet our clients’ needs while compensating us for services provided in a fair and reasonable manner. For example, we might enter into an hourly fee agreement with a “not to exceed” cap on our total fee, or we might offer a flat fee to prepare necessary transaction documents or play a well-defined role, with additional services, such as negotiations and changes or responses to governmental filings, provided at a discounted hourly rate.

Written Fee Agreements

Whenever we enter into an alternative fee arrangement, we prepare a simple written fee agreement so that both parties have a clear understanding of how the arrangement will work and exactly what services will be provided under the alternative arrangement, and which will be billed hourly.