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Acquire the firm. We integrate it. A managed service for law firm groups that need to move fast without spending like it.

A private-equity-backed group has acquired 7 UK law firms and is bringing all of them onto a single operating platform by the end of 2026, while continuing to acquire. Every completion is an integration programme in its own right. Rather than build an in-house integration function for work that arrives in waves, the group runs it through 3Rive as a managed service: programme management, data migration and firm onboarding, delivered as one accountable capability, at a cost structure a PE investment case can carry.

The Challenge

A consolidator faces a problem no single firm has. Each acquisition brings a practice management system to retire, matter and finance data to migrate, documents to move into the group platform, and a new set of people to bring onto group ways of working. Do that 7 times in 2 years and you have a standing programme, not a project.

The group's central technology team has to run that programme while also running the group day to day: shared services for 7 firms, a Databricks lakehouse, a new practice management platform going live. Both draw on the same small team, and integration work is structurally at tension with keeping the lights on.

The PE context sharpens the problem. The investment case assumes integration of synergies on a timetable. Every month a firm sits outside the group platform is a month of duplicated cost and unrealised margin. At the same time, building a permanent integration function means carrying PMO, migration, and engineering headcount through the gaps between deals, which the same investment case cannot absorb.

The group's Chief Information Officer needed integration delivered fast and repeatably, without the fixed cost of owning the capability.

The Solution: Integration as a Managed Service

3Rive operates the group's firm-integration capability as a managed service under a single master services agreement. The group decides what to acquire and when. 3Rive carries the integration.

Programme Management
A senior 3Rive programme director leads the group's PMO full time, reporting to the CIO and COO. The role owns the integrated plan across all 7 migrations: sequencing, governance and steering, dependency management across practice management, document management and data workstreams, and a single view of status and risk for group leadership.
Data Migration and the Group Lakehouse
3Rive data engineers work inside the group's data programme on Databricks, building the pipelines that move each acquired firm's Aderant, ShareDo and legacy data into the group model, and the lakehouse foundation that serves group-wide reporting once migration is done. The lead engineer works hands-on in Databricks in production with Azure Databricks Platform Architect accreditation; behind the team sits a 3Rive architect who built a unified data platform across 7 source systems for a global insurance-led firm and led 5 legacy case-management migrations there.
Firm Onboarding
Beyond the systems, each acquired firm needs its people, processes and support moved onto group standards. 3Rive's delivery team runs that onboarding as part of the same service, so the group's central team is not pulled off business-as-usual every time a deal completes.
Repeatable by Design
The first integrations established the playbook: migration patterns, data mappings, cutover runbooks, onboarding sequences. Each subsequent firm runs the same playbook faster. Integration is now delivered as a fixed-scope bundle per acquired firm, so it is a known line in every transaction model rather than a cost discovered afterwards.
Inside the Group's Governance
The service sits inside the group's structure, uses the group's tools and clears work through the group's sign-off. There is no separate 3Rive project alongside the group's programme. There is the group's programme, with 3Rive accountable for delivering it.

The Approach

Treat the consolidator as two businesses. Run the group and grow the group. Resource the growth stream as a managed service, so it never competes with business-as-usual for the same people.
One accountable capability. PMO, migration and onboarding under one agreement and one delivery lead, rather than three vendors and an internal coordinator.
Hands-on the actual stack. Databricks engineers who build on Databricks; an architect who has migrated legal practice-management data before.
Onboard in weeks. Profiles within a day of the intro call; engagements executed within 3 weeks; people working inside the group's environment within its standard onboarding window.
Rotate without friction. A standing guarantee that any individual can be swapped for a better fit with no cost to velocity.
Run it as a product. A repeatable integration bundle with a known scope and a known cost per firm.

If you are acquiring firms faster than you can integrate them, you do not need an integration department. You need a partner who runs integration as a service, on a cost base your investment case can carry. That is what we do.

Outcomes

Operational

Group PMO running the single-platform migration programme across all 7 firms, reporting to the CIO and COO
Acquired-firm data migrated into the group Databricks lakehouse through repeatable pipelines built by 3Rive
Integration capability stood up under one agreement within 3 weeks of first conversation
Resource fit corrected within 24 hours when the group asked for deeper platform experience

Commercial

Integration capacity that scales with the acquisition pipeline and stands down between deals, with no permanent headcount carried
Fixed-scope integration per acquired firm, so every transaction model carries a known integration cost

Strategic

A single governed view of integration status and risk for group leadership and investors
Whole-of-group model in operation: data platform, managed support and a repeatable integration bundle for every acquisition