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Therium’s Financial Commitments To Access To Justice Causes Surpass £1.7m

December 15, 2020

Therium’s Financial Commitments To Access To Justice Causes Surpass £1.7m

Jersey, 15th December 2020: Therium Access, the not-for-profit arm of global litigation funder Therium Capital Management, has announced the recipients of its latest grant round. The Autumn 2020 grants have been awarded to six organisations and brings the total number of organisations receiving grants to 32 with over £1.7m committed since its inception in 2019.

The Autumn 2020 grant round remained focused on the issues exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic, with a focus on supporting work which is difficult to find funding for elsewhere, scalable delivery models, preservation of legal specialisation and work of strategic importance. Areas of law such as employment and housing were focussed on as these services face a huge surge in demand. Issues facing vulnerable young people were also prioritised.

As the Covid-19 pandemic continues into 2021, these organisations will continue to serve as a lifeline to the most vulnerable and marginalised in society. Additional grants have been awarded to two current grantees.

The recipients of the Therium Access Autumn 2020 grant round are:

  • Bristol Law Centre: The grant will increase capacity in employment and housing, enabling Bristol Law Centre to deliver a full service including complex advice and casework, in a wider geographical area without the limitations of Legal Aid work.
  • Child Poverty Action Group: The grant is for the continuation of funding for a solicitor in the charity’s strategic litigation team and other various costs as it continues to promote and protect the rights of children and families and maximise family incomes.
  • Legal Action Group: The grant is for a new Housing Possession Duty Desk: a practical guide. The Guide will provide a practical, accessible and affordable source of information for advisers at Housing Possession Court Duty Schemes.
  • Project for the Registration of Children as British Citizens: The grant is towards PRCBC’s core costs to support delivery of their pro bono strategic casework that ensures young people are aware of and able to exercise their rights to British citizenship.
  • South West London Law Centre: This grant will fund a Housing Court Crisis Navigator who will give practical help and support to deal with the underlying issues of people seen by their housing and debt teams in Croydon.
  • Youth Legal: The grant is for the salary and associated costs of a part-time Development worker to support Youth Legal’s vital work and to reach out to their communities, develop strong networks, and coordinate projects.

Jeunesse Mensier, Grant Programme Director at Therium Access, said: “Our Autumn 2020 grant round has again shown us the excellent and necessary work that organisations and individuals provide across the country in facilitating access to justice. We are so pleased to be supporting these six impressive and inspiring organisations which help some of the most vulnerable in our society in the areas of citizenship, employment and housing.”

Lord Falconer, Chairman of Therium Access Advisory Committee said: “During such a difficult time, legal advice has never been more important. It’s so brilliant to see Therium Access lead the way and provide much-needed financial support to such worthy organisations that provide free legal advice to strive and reduce the ever-increasing justice gap. We look forward to seeing other funders follow suit.”

Solange Valdez-Symonds, Solicitor and Director of Project for the Registration of Children as British Citizens said: “PRCBC’s core activity is assisting, including by litigation, children and young people to secure their rights to British citizenship. This grant from Therium Access is vital for our continued ability to deliver on this – and not only to directly assist more children and young people. It enables us to bring our expertise and experience to bear in challenging the several injustices in policy and practice that deprive so many more children and young people of the security and recognition that is theirs by right through registration of citizenship. Thank you Therium Access.”

Louisa McGeehan, Director of Policy at Child Poverty Action Group said: “Funding from Therium Access Fund for a further year will enable us to continue our award-winning work in ensuring low-income families have access to justice.  The need is greater than ever given the unprecedented number of families claiming universal credit as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. renewed funding will help us in our ongoing work of ensuring that laws relating to social security entitlement are made and applied in compliance with fundamental rule of law requirements and that ordinary individuals will be able to hold the government to account when this is not the case.”

Applications for the Spring 2021 grant round will close on 15th April 2021 with priorities being confirmed in early 2021.

About Therium Access:

Therium Access is the primary expression of Therium’s corporate and social responsibility programme. Therium Access dispenses with the criteria of funding for profit and has the sole purpose of facilitating access to justice.  Therium Access is a mark of Therium’s wider commitment to the pursuit of justice and the rule of law.

Therium Access accepts applications from charities and other entities whose services and projects facilitate access to justice or from those seeking assistance to obtain legal representation on cases (including defence) which have strategic importance. The applicant’s need and the impact of the grant will be important factors in our review process. The deadline for the submission of the next round of grant applications is 15 April 2021. In addition, urgent applications may be considered on an ad hoc basis. Applications need to be made by legal representatives or the entity seeking a grant.  The board of Therium Access is assisted by an Advisory Committee which is chaired by Lord Falconer, former Lord Chancellor, Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs and Secretary of State for Justice.

Therium Access aims to support access to justice in the broadest terms and considers applications that further the following causes (in no particular order):

  • The right to legal representation or due process;
  • The proper and efficient administration of justice;
  • The advancement of human rights;
  • The promotion of equality of rights and diversity;
  • The protection of children, the elderly, the disabled, minorities, asylum seekers and other vulnerable or disadvantaged groups;
  • The advancement of environmental protection or improvement;
  • The promotion of legal education that furthers the causes listed above; and
  • Any other case or project in which a person, group, or entity will not have access to justice without financial assistance.

Therium Access is intended to be a global initiative. Its initial focus is on the UK and it will be rolled out in other jurisdictions in a number of planned phases.

About Therium Capital Management:

Therium is a leading provider of investment capital to the legal industry and one of the largest, having raised over $1 bn since 2009.  With investment teams in the UK, USA, Australia, Germany and Norway, Therium has funded litigation and arbitration claims exceeding $40 billion including many of the largest and most high profile funded cases in the UK and internationally, including arbitrations under rules of the LCIA, ICC, UNCITRAL, LMAA, AAA, CIETAC, ICSID, Stockholm Chamber of Commerce and the Energy Charter Treaty.  Therium has been Top Ranked by Chambers and Partners and Leaders League with investment officers across the UK, Europe, USA and Asia Pac recognised as leading individuals in litigation finance.

Last year to mark the firm’s tenth anniversary, Therium Access was launched as a not-for-profit venture to fund a wide range of access to justice projects and cases – supporting the most vulnerable in our society and helping to bridge the widening justice gap. With its own board composed of eminent figures from the legal community and a dedicated grants officer, Therium Access has made over £1.7 m in financial commitments over the last 22 months to over 32 different organisations. As the first initiative of its kind, Therium has been shortlisted for several awards for launching this ground-breaking initiative, including the FT Innovative Lawyer Awards 2019, the Lexis Nexis Awards 2020 and The Lawyer Awards 2020.

Therium also invests in AI and software projects to accelerate the advancement of the industry. As a founding member of both the ALF, ILFA and the Litigation Funding Working Group, Therium is also committed to shaping the future of legal finance and setting high standards for the industry.

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Padronus Finances Collective Action Against Meta Over Illegal Surveillance

By John Freund |

Austrian litigation funder Padronus is financing the largest collective action ever filed in the German-speaking world. The case targets Meta’s illegal surveillance practices.

Together with the Austrian Consumer Protection Association (VSV) as claimant, the German law firm Baumeister & Kollegen, and the Austrian law firm Salburg Rechtsanwälte, Padronus has filed collective actions in both Germany and Austria against Meta Platforms Ireland Ltd. The lawsuits challenge Meta’s extensive surveillance of the public, which, according to Padronus and VSV, violates European data protection law.

“Meta knows far more about us than we imagine – from our shopping habits and searches for medication to personal struggles. This is made possible by so-called business tools that are deployed across the internet. The U.S. corporation is present on third-party sites even when we are logged out of its platforms or when our browser settings promise privacy. This breaches the GDPR,” explains Richard Eibl, Managing Director of Padronus.

Meta generates revenue by allowing companies to place paid advertisements on Instagram and Facebook. Which ad is shown to which user depends on the user’s interests, identified by Meta’s algorithm based on platform activity and social connections. In addition, Meta has developed tools such as the “Meta Pixel,” embedded on countless third-party websites, including those dealing with sensitive personal matters. The “Conversions API” is integrated directly on web servers, meaning data collection no longer occurs on the user’s device and cannot be detected or disabled, even by technically savvy users. It bypasses cookie restrictions, incognito mode, or VPN usage.

Millions of businesses worldwide use these tools to target consumers and analyze ad effectiveness. “Use of these technologies is now omnipresent and an integral part of daily internet usage. Every user becomes uniquely identifiable to Meta at all times as soon as they browse third-party sites, even if not logged into Facebook or Instagram. Meta learns which pages and subpages are visited, what is clicked, searched, and purchased,” says Eibl. He adds: “This surveillance has gone further than George Orwell anticipated in 1984 – at least his protagonist was aware of the extent of his surveillance.”

While Meta users can configure settings on Instagram and Facebook to prevent the collected data from being used for the delivery of personalized advertising, the data itself is nevertheless already transmitted to Meta from third-party websites prior to obtaining consent to cookies. Meta then, without exception, transfers the data worldwide to third countries, in particular to the United States, where it evaluates the data to an unknown extent and passes it on to third parties such as service providers, external researchers, and authorities.

Numerous German district courts (including Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, Cologne, Düsseldorf, Stuttgart, Leipzig) and more than 70 other courts have already confirmed Meta’s illegal surveillance in over 700 ongoing individual lawsuits. These first-instance rulings, achieved by lawyers Baumeister & Kollegen, are not yet final. Eibl notes: “The courts have awarded plaintiffs immaterial damages of up to €5,000. If only one in ten of the up to 50 million affected individuals in Germany joins the collective action, the dispute value rises to €25 billion. This is the largest lawsuit ever filed in the German-speaking world.”

Meta’s lack of seriousness about user privacy is well-documented. In 2023, Ireland’s data protection authority fined Meta €1.2 billion for illegal U.S. data transfers. In 2021, Luxembourg imposed a €746 million fine for misuse of user data for advertising. In 2024, Ireland again fined Meta €251 million for a major security breach. In July 2025, a U.S. lawsuit was launched against several Meta executives, demanding $8 billion in damages for systematic violations of an FTC privacy order. Richard Eibl notes: “This case goes to the heart of Meta’s business model. If we succeed, Meta will have to stop this unlawful spying in our countries.”

The new collective action mechanism for qualified entities such as VSV is a novel legal instrument. If successful, the unlawful practice must be ceased, and compensation paid to consumers who have joined the case.

The lawsuit is expected to trigger political tensions with the current protectionist U.S. administration. Only last week, the U.S. President again threatened the EU with new tariffs after the Commission imposed a €2.95 billion fine on Google. “We expect the U.S. government will also try to exert pressure in our case to shield Meta. But European data protection law is not negotiable, and we are certain we will not bow to such pressure,” says Julius Richter, also Managing Director of Padronus.

Consumers in Austria and Germany can now register at meta-klage.de and meta-klage.at to join the collective action without any cost risk. Padronus covers all litigation expenses; only in the event of success will a commission be deducted from the recovered amount.

Announcements Commercial

Kerberos Named Finalist for 2025 CIO Industry Innovation Awards in Private Credit

By John Freund |

Kerberos Capital Management has been named one of only four finalists nationwide for Chief Investment Officer (CIO) magazine’s 2025 Industry Innovation Awards in the Private Credit category.

Each year, CIO magazine honors organizations that demonstrate “truly exceptional approaches to the challenges of institutional asset ownership and asset management.” This recognition highlights Kerberos’ leadership in private credit and its innovative strategies that continue to set new standards in the institutional investing market.

“We are proud to be recognized among the top firms in the country for our work in private credit,” said Joe Siprut, CEO & CIO of Kerberos Capital Management. “This acknowledgment underscores our team’s commitment to innovation, disciplined risk management, and delivering differentiated value to our investors.”

Kerberos’ inclusion as a finalist reinforces its growing national reputation as a forward-thinking investment manager that thrives on tackling complex challenges, seeking to generate alpha from complexity but not from increased risk.

About Kerberos Capital Management

Kerberos Capital Management is an SEC-registered investment adviser and alternative investment manager, providing creative solutions for those seeking capital in special situations. Kerberos’ flagship private credit strategy emphasizes legal assets and other complex collateral. Kerberos manages both a pooled vehicle and separate accounts for institutional and high net worth investors worldwide.

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New North Litigation Capital Launches, Backed by £50 Million in Senior Secured Financing from Pollen Street Capital

By John Freund |

Pollen Street Capital ("Pollen Street") today announces a new senior secured credit facility of up to £50 million to New North Litigation Capital (“New North”). New North is a commercial litigation finance company and a direct subsidiary of Capital Law, a Cardiff based law firm founded in 2006.

Capital Law has a strong track record in commercial litigation, having closed over 400 claimant cases since 2001 with a 95% win rate. Drawing on its senior leadership and experienced disputes team, Capital Law launched New North to address the underserved small to mid-market segment of commercial litigation market. 

New North will be the only litigation financier in the UK owned and operated by practicing lawyers, bringing their day to day lived experience of handling mid-market litigation into pricing the risk and the funding investment decisions.

Christopher Nott, Founder and CEO of New North commented: “We are pleased to work with Pollen Street on this financing to launch New North Litigation Capital. The funding supports us to bridge a critical gap by funding claims that are often deemed too small by other players in the market. We are excited to work with the Pollen Street team as we create this new kind of litigation funding.”

Connor Marshall-Mckie, Investment Director at Pollen Street, commented: “New North addresses an important gap in the litigation funding space, focusing on smaller mid-market commercial litigation. With the significant opportunity available and the deep experience of the leadership team from Capital Law we are excited to partner with the team to support their growth.”

About Pollen Street

Pollen Street is a fast-growing and high-performing private capital asset manager. Established in 2013, the firm has built deep capability across the real estate, financial and business services sectors aligned with mega-trends shaping the future of the industry. Pollen Street manages over €7bn AUM across private equity and credit strategies on behalf of investors including leading public and corporate pension funds, insurance companies, sovereign wealth funds, endowments and foundations, asset managers, banks, and family offices from around the world. Pollen Street has a team of over 95 professionals.