Abiding love affair yields jobs boost for North

Holiday romances rarely last but a love affair that began on a sojourn to Derry almost 20 years ago is proof that some can have a happy ending; and even create jobs and life-changing investment opportunities in the process.

Almost two decades ago Russell Smith was a partner in a high-profile New York law firm, enjoying the kind of success he had worked extremely hard to achieve.

But he became disillusioned with what he was doing.

“I liked the work but I didn’t like the battles over money,” he says.

So his solution was to “take off”.

He had been a frequent visitor to Ireland and was so enamoured with it he decided he would head there on a sabbatical. Smith wanted to find a specific location for this sabbatical – he wanted to be on the coast, somewhere isolated where he could contemplate his future in seclusion.

His search for the perfect spot took him along the western coastline of Ireland but he could not find exactly what he was looking for until he came across Malin Head.

It was, Smith decided, the perfect location for reflection so he decided to rent a house nearby for a year. What he did not factor in was how friendly his new neighbourhood would be.

Welcoming location “I planned to be somewhere remote but people kept knocking on the door and I found myself doing more socialising than I would ever have done back in New York.

Then friends kept coming to visit and staying so it didn’t work out as I had planned – but I got to know the northwest and Derry and the people very well.

“I also realised that I enjoyed practising law but I wanted to do it in a different way so I decided to go back and set up my own firm – I started from scratch again as a solo lawyer with one client,” he says.

Eighteen years later, SmithDehn is a major international entertainment, media and legal firm. Its client list reads like the credits of a hit television show or movie and includes HBO, Sasha Baron Cohen, Sony Pictures, 20th Century Fox , Channel Four Television and the likes of the William J. Clinton Foundation.

The firm operates in Manhattan, Los Angeles, Washington DC, London, and Mysore, India, and now thanks to Smith's enduring love affair Derry and the northwest is also set to join that list.

SmithDehn plans to develop a new base in the city which it believes will generate about 75 jobs over the next five years. Alongside the legal team it hopes to develop, the American firm has also brought its latest business venture, Social Construct Media, to the North.

The firm, which will specialise in TV development, financing, production and sales, will also be based in Derry and plans to produce TV and films in the North from the autumn.

Smith says SmithDehn is close to choosing its Derry offices but he says the firm may also open a second office in Letterkenny. The decision to expand the firm’s presence to Derry and the northwest is not based on any sentimentality or any personal fondness he has for the city, says Smith.

Instead it is because it is the right location for the firm – on the basis of cost effectiveness, availability of talent and time zone considerations.

SmithDehn had already dipped a toe in the water before it officially chose Derry thanks to its partnership with the University of Ulster in Magee.

The law firm helped deliver a masters level international entertainment and media law course there earlier this year.

Smith and several people from his firm shared their expertise and knowledge on the course and he also enlisted senior in-house lawyers from HBO to come to Derry as guest lecturers.

HBO collaboration According to Dr Eugene McNamee, head of the University of Ulster’s law school, the collaboration of SmithDehn and HBO was a breakthrough for the city.

According to Smith the “tremendous enthusiasm, talent and excitement” which exists in Derry today – as opposed to the city he experienced 20 years ago – makes it an unrivalled investment proposition.