With law firms looking to revive their business post recession, a legal process outsourcing boom is in the offing.

Outsourcing research group, ValueNotes reports that the legal industry will add momentum when the economy heads toward a recovery up in 2010. The group speculates that there is bound to be some consolidation within the legal process outsourcing industry. In addition to that, some new law firms will crop up in the fight for control over the capacity of work in India.

Along with that, smaller businesses are also expected to mushroom and they will eventually become targets for takeovers or joint ventures, reports cpaglobal.com.

ValueNotes’ report is titled ‘Legal Services Outsourcing: Crisis Creates New Opportunities for LPOs’ and it concentrates on the Indian offshoring sector and its overall performance. Although the report implies that offshoring of legal services to India has declined in the last two years due to a recession, the industry has added a massive 16% in the year 2008-2009.

With a recovery looming, the LPO business in India are expected to hit $440 million toward the end of 2010. Director of legal services outsourcing at CPA Global, Paul McGolpin said in a statement that the biggest law firms in the U.K. are associated with outsourcing. These firms are either directly or indirectly to outsourcing providers via their corporate clients.

Legal consultant at outsourcing advisory firm OMC Partners, Jack Diggle said that in general legal work has declined and this has had a rub-off effect on LPO work as well. Nonetheless, he added that almost every law firm considers LPO as a means of cutting costs. Diggle noted that we are close to a surge in LPO activity, particularly since there has been a significant move toward LPO in 2009. This trend is unlikely to reverse, say analysts.