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20 www.canadianlawyermag.com FEATURE IN MARCH, corporate law firms were worried. What was going to happen to the business if beleaguered clients took shelter from the pandemic storm and put aside projects or deal-making? How would oper- ations continue as staff were forced to work from home but still provide service as if they were at the office? For those on our list of top corporate law firms, the answers may be surprising. Some types of business slowed down, but the need for other services remained solid. And, surprisingly, some law firms saw certain types of work grow fast. Mining deals, whether financings or M&A, increased thanks to higher prices for gold, silver and other commodities that made projects potentially more profitable. Transactions 2020 Top Corporate Boutiques Sure, the pandemic slowed some areas of corporate legal work, but other areas, such as financings, have been booming HOW WE DID IT Canadian Lawyer asked lawyers, in-house counsel and clients from across Canada to vote on the top corporate law boutiques. They were asked to rank their top firms from a preliminary list, with a chance to nominate a firm that was not included on the list. To be considered in the vote, firms were required to have at least 80 per cent of their business come from corporate law. The final rankings were determined through a points system, in which firms were rewarded on a sliding scale for the number of first to 10th-place votes received. The quantitative results are combined with feedback from respected senior members of the bar and in-house counsel when applicable. TOP 10 CORPORATE BOUTIQUES in the tech sector remained robust and perhaps even increased, in size if not volume, because COVID-19 showed the usefulness of innovations that were being developed long before the pandemic hit — innovations that made working or learning remotely easier. The great innovator Alexander Graham Bell once said: "When one door closes, another opens, but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us." These top 10 corporate boutiques have kept their eyes on that open door.