International firm Taylor Wessing has launched an employee incentive scheme which will see workers receive crypto tokens for ‘outstanding contributions’ to the firm.

The new initiative, believed to be the first of its kind in the legal market globally, is built on and operated using distributed ledger technology. It is designed to provide micro-incentives to Taylor Wessing’s lawyers and ‘enhance the firm’s leading blockchain, digital asset and cryptocurrency practice’.

Lawyers within the firm’s corporate, IP and financial services teams will each have a Metamask wallet where they can interact with tokens issued by the firm, dubbed LAW Tokens.

Lawyers will be able to award LAW tokens to each other. Lawyers who ‘demonstrate an outstanding contribution to the firm’s culture and its responsible business objectives’ could receive LAW Tokens which can then be traded with other lawyers on the blockchain, redeemed with the firm for monetary vouchers which can be used 'in a variety of retail stores', or donated to charity.

The token’s smart contract only allows tokens to be transferred between whitelisted individuals, in a bid to prevent a secondary market. The scheme falls outside of Electronic Money Regulations and does not require Taylor Wessing to be registered with the FCA under money laundering regulations.

It is hoped using the scheme will give lawyers first-hand experience of distributed ledger technology, which is used by a ‘significant number’ of Taylor Wessing’s clients within the technology sector.

Partner Angus Miln, executive board member and head of emerging companies and venture capital, said: ‘A very significant number of our clients in the tech space are developing distributed ledger applications and we are representing an increasing number of blockchain and crypto businesses, as well as investors in - and acquirers of - those businesses.

‘We want our people to develop the skills necessary for us to continue to expand our practice in these areas.’

A group across the firm’s corporate and emerging companies and financial services regulatory teams, headed by blockchain specialist Miguel Dinis Lucas, worked closely with the firm’s Entrepreneur-in-Residence Gerard Frith, as well as members of the firm’s tech, information and IP team to create and launch the project.

Corporate M&A partner Paul Thorpe said: 'The launch of the blockchain initiative harnesses the very best of Taylor Wessing’s specialist expertise in the blockchain sector and demonstrates our culture of innovating to provide technology focused solutions to clients. We have exciting plans in relation to how we further evolve this technology and potentially link it to some of our other tech projects. Watch this space!'

 

This article is now closed for comment.