We are among the finalists of The Lawyer European Awards – in three categories
European Energy Transition Team of the Year, Best Transformation Initiative and Law Firm of the Year: Central Europe – these are our nominations on this year’s shortlist for The Lawyer European Awards. These are truly special recognitions in what has been an extraordinary year – one marked by bold, strategic decisions, carefully chosen areas of specialisation, and our involvement in projects that will shape the future of Poland and Central Europe for decades to come.
European Energy Transition Team of the Year – the law that is reshaping the continent’s energy future
When Łukasz Młynarkiewicz took the helm of the nuclear energy practice, he made clear that his ambition was to build a team capable, above all, of understanding the challenges and opportunities that come with a broad-based energy transition. The construction of Poland’s first nuclear power plant, European SMRs, the expansion of renewables and grid modernisation, together with the accompanying investment, modernisation, management and deregulation processes, are historic projects already under way. Thanks to the vision and determination of Łukasz and Piotr Kochański, we are an active adviser and a committed participant in each of them.
Poland has never had such an advanced, modern nuclear programme, and our team is now helping to shape its regulatory framework. This is no longer purely advisory work, but a conscious shared responsibility for the system, instruments and mechanisms that will govern Polish nuclear energy for generations to come.
It has been an exceptional year for the Infrastructure, Energy, Environment and ESG Practice Group:
- Continued growth in the energy practice’s project pipeline – spanning nuclear energy, offshore wind, hydrogen, oil and gas, renewables and energy storage
- An increasingly mature and pioneering portfolio of matters:
- We act as advisers to Polskie Elektrownie Jądrowe (Polish Nuclear Power Plants)
- We advised on the construction of a 100 MW green hydrogen production plant
- We are leading the sale of one of Poland’s largest battery energy storage projects – a 280 MW facility
- We advised on a landmark corporate restructuring that has since become a benchmark for the entire sector, demonstrating that large energy groups can strategically unbundle their asset portfolios to accelerate decarbonisation and unlock new financing opportunities
Today, we can say that our energy practice itself has undergone a transformation, to become one of Poland’s leading advisers on energy security. This is due to our consistently combining vision and strategy with precision in delivering even the most demanding and multidisciplinary projects. It is this unique blend that makes us both a force shaping Central Europe’s energy landscape and a serious contender for the title of European Energy Transition Team of the Year.
Best Transformation Initiative
We have always invested in innovation that gives us technological sovereignty and agility. Yet we reached a point where we had to ask ourselves how to ensure that the knowledge gained through successive challenging projects becomes embedded in the culture of the entire organisation. How can we preserve that unique legacy – proven litigation strategies, the nuances of sector-specific advice, and the precise lines of argument developed across hundreds of proceedings – much of which lives in the minds of specific individuals or gets lost in the pace of daily practice?
We wanted to solve that problem. And we did it our own way.
We already had iRaaport – our proprietary ERP-class system, developed when the solutions available on the market proved unable to cater to the specifics of our firm. Over the years it grew alongside the organisation and became a powerful knowledge base. It was on that foundation that we decided to build the next generation of technological advantage. LEGORA provided the intelligence layer – the ability to work with the firm’s entire body of know-how at a speed that had previously been unattainable.
The objective was straightforward: to create a digital ecosystem that would not only support and automate lawyers’ day-to-day work, but above all understand our firm – its specialisations, processes and history – while enabling us to preserve our knowledge and, building on what we had already achieved, create something of an entirely new calibre. An ecosystem that would keep us in full control of our tools, data and expertise, rather than surrendering them to external providers.
The guiding principle was non-negotiable: that no system could replace a human being. But a human being smartly supported by a system can harness technology as a powerful lever of value. This is why we chose to deploy AI in a targeted, precise manner, striking directly at the most costly and time-consuming processes. And that is why we chose LEGORA, a system that intelligently supports the work of lawyers.
Crucially, all the underlying processes stay in-house. Documents, written submissions, case notes and records of client discussions all feed into iRaaport. Analyses and proven strategies go into a shared repository. Onboarding a new lawyer takes less time. Taking over matter from a colleague is smoother. And the organisation’s know-how ceases to be the private asset of individual staff members.
The implementation was not an IT project. It was a deliberate choice of another driver of growth.
Today, AI supports every area of the firm’s operations – from legal work through marketing and business development to finance and IT. We are scaling our activities, intensifying cross-departmental collaboration and building a network of AI ambassadors who foster a technology-driven culture within their teams. Because technology is not a threat. It is our competitive edge.
And that is precisely why we are reaching for the title of Best Transformation Initiative.
Law Firm of the Year: Central Europe
Six years ago we proudly accepted this award. Since then, we have been through the most transformative chapter in our nearly 30-year history. It has been a period of significant strategic change:
- Professionalisation of firm management and the appointment to the board of a new generation of partners, including non-lawyers who are outstanding specialists in finance, IT, marketing and business development
- Expansion of the project portfolio to include complex, multidisciplinary and multi-jurisdictional mandates
- Development of deep and broad sector expertise in energy, technology, infrastructure, defence and international finance
- Active participation in the most important economic and social debates – as a partner in deregulation projects, an initiator of the discussion on the fiscal consequences of bank loan settlements, and one of the leading voices in the public debate on the direction in which the Polish economy is heading
- Purposeful change from within – we run mentoring programmes and masterclass series for junior lawyers, and create space for discussions on women’s rights and employee wellbeing. Because we know that the firm of the future starts with the people we are developing today
During this time, Poland itself has been changing, consolidating its position as the region’s growth champion. We are the strategic centre of NATO’s eastern flank and are increasing defence spending, we have also secured billions of euros under the EU’s SAFE programme, and our country is the principal hub for the post-war reconstruction of Ukraine.
Three nominations across nearly 30 years of Kochański & Partners
Three nominations in as many categories tell a single, coherent story. The story of a firm that has placed its bets on intellectual, technological and strategic boldness. A firm that does not wait for change but actively shapes it – in nuclear law, in digital transformation, in the defence of freedom of expression. A firm that pursues its mission day by day and step by step.
The results of The Lawyer European Awards final will be announced shortly.
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