Phillip Wotton's documented life is centred on Sydney, where he trained in law and built his professional career. Sydney is the capital of New South Wales, and the University of Sydney, established under an 1850 New South Wales Act, is the oldest university in Australia.
Wotton studied at the University of Sydney, where he took the Bachelor of Laws degree. The university was established under the Act to Incorporate and Endow the University of Sydney, passed in 1850, and it is Australia's oldest university.
Law was one of the university's first three faculties, inaugurated in 1855 alongside Arts and Medicine. The faculty began as a body for examinations rather than teaching, and a full programme of legal instruction started in 1890 after the appointment of its first dean. By the time Wotton was admitted to the bar in 1972, the Sydney law school had a long-established place within the university.
Wotton was admitted to the bar in Australia in 1972, entering the legal profession in New South Wales. He later practised as a partner at Phillips Fox, a Sydney law firm.
Phillips Fox traced its origins to 1864, when it was founded as P.D. Phillips, and it later described itself as one of the largest law firms in Australasia. When David Kearney joined the firm in 1995, Kearney recalled that Phillips Fox was then regarded as the premier insurance firm, and it was there that he met Wotton, then a partner. The firm later operated as DLA Phillips Fox within the global DLA Piper network, and its Australian business was absorbed into DLA Piper in 2011.
In 2002 Wotton and Kearney established Wotton Kearney in Sydney with two partners and four lawyers. Kearney has said that the partners concluded Phillips Fox was not the right firm to meet their clients' needs, and that they saw an opportunity to set up their own practice. The firm later described itself as Asia Pacific's insurance and risk legal business, and it opened a Singapore office as its first step into Asia.
Wotton's documented professional relationship with David Kearney began at Phillips Fox, where Kearney joined in 1995 and met Wotton, then a partner. Kearney later described Wotton as his future business partner and friend. The two co-founded Wotton Kearney in 2002, establishing an insurance-focused legal practice that became the central institution of Wotton's later career.
